For Blood or For Love
by MandyQ
Summary: A Malfoy marriage is a serious thing, and old prejudices die hard. Should Draco marry for blood or for love? Meet the modern Malfoys two years after the war and hear arguments from both sides. TDH compliant. TDH spoilers. COMPLETE. Pls R&R.
1. Chapter 1

DISCLAIMER: These Malfoys are mostly not mine. Their world is not mine, and their magic is also not mine. Some of these Malfoys are mine, but those are so closely related to the ones who aren't that I am not making any money on any of them. These Malfoys belong to JK Rowling and Scholastic and maybe even Warner. I am using them without permission but intend no infringement so please don't sue me.

REALLY GUYS! It's a new Malfoy fic for 2009. This first chapter fought with me and I can only hope it is good enough to make you want to read more.

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September 7, 2000

There were children running around everywhere; Draco didn't even know where most of them had come from. It was his little sister's first birthday and the Malfoys must have invited every child in Wiltshire County. There were at least half a dozen youngsters playing croquet on the lawn with Aunt An' and two-and-a-half year-old Teddy, none of whom Draco recognized. His mother was sitting quietly underneath a parasol on the Veranda with three-week-old Isis in a nearby bassinette and the birthday girl on her knee, all of them surrounded by even more strange little ones. Lilith was entertaining the lot of them by picking the little animated candy animals off of her birthday cake and alternately biting the heads off of the creatures or offering them to her new baby sister to receive similar treatment. Isis, who was sound asleep and had no teeth in the first place, was amassing quite a collection of icing-covered sugar animals and Draco was amazed at how well Narcissa was taking the mess.

Normally, he would have tried to help. He had fallen in love with little Lilith the day she was born and he had spent a great deal of time with his sister over the past year. He had become especially close to the little girl after his parents had discovered that Isis was on the way. When his mother's health had taken a turn for the worse as Isis's birth approached, Draco had even moved back home temporarily to help his ailing mother and terrified father with the care of their baby girl. Lilith had come in to the world so easily that there hadn't been much ado in expecting Isis, but a second baby in the space of a year had lived up to any fear that the Malfoys had ever had and nearly cost Narcissa her life. But she was well now, and both of Draco's baby sisters were well, and he wished he could be happy about it.

But he had his own life to deal with today. He was in love with a girl and she was leaving. He looked out onto the lawn where she was helping Teddy with his mallet and frowned at her.

He had first met Emily Flinders as a fifth year student when Orinda Hartlestead had snuck off campus after curfew and Draco had threatened to tattle on her if she didn't take him along. That night's destination had been a party for Emily; on the occasion of her acceptance into the apprentice Healer program at St. Mungo's in London. He had run into her again a year and a half ago at Orinda's wedding to Quidditch legend Aiden Lynch and it hadn't been long before he was spending every available minute with her.

Emily was great. A strawberry blonde with tiny freckles and a sunny disposition, she was nothing like any of the girls he had dated before. It was nice, actually, to be with someone who barely knew and didn't care a lick about his and his family's history. Emily hadn't even gone to Hogwarts; she had been schooled at Clontarf Academy, where Orinda had done her undergraduate work, before being taken on at St. Mungo's. She made him happy, and he was happy; but she was too good for him and he was about to pay the price for that.

"You look like someone's gotten you with a stinging hex," Draco heard Orinda call to him from behind. He turned around and crossed his arms.

"I'm not speaking to you," he growled.

"Funny how I just heard your voice," she said back to him, shoving a glass of purple punch into his hand.

"Oh shut up," was all the retort he could muster.

"What a brilliant comeback," Orinda smarted. Draco rolled his eyes; he knew she wouldn't let him get away with a weak snark. "Now do you want to tell me what's crawled up your arse and died?" she asked, elbowing him in the ribs.

"You know good and well what's got me in this mood," Draco answered glumly.

"You're all gloom and doom because Emily's leaving tomorrow?" she offered. Draco nodded. He shook his head and plopped down to sit on the concrete railing at the edge of the veranda.

"For a month," he reminded her.

"I am well aware of how long Emily and Dr. Bradenberg will be gone," Orinda said back to him.

"Dr. Bradenberg…." Draco grumbled. Dr. Lille Bradenberg was Emily's boss. A healer with a muggle MD to boot, she had been instrumental in saving Draco's mother's life just last month. Dr. Bradenberg had delivered both of his baby sisters, and for that he was grateful. But it had been her bright idea that she and Emily spend a month in an orphanage in Calcutta. He hated her for that.

"Ach, mo chroi," Orinda comforted him with a hand on his shoulder, "it's just a month."

"Just a month," Draco snarled. "It's a month with you off at Hogwarts," he pointed out, "with Lynch out playing matches all over the place, with Goyle in America…." He threw his hands into the air, "I'll be bored to death."

"I doubt anyone has ever died from loss of consortium," she insisted.

"Well there's a first time for everything," Draco insisted, taking a sip of punch. "And you," he turned back to her, "you're just letting her go."

"She's my friend, Draco," Orinda answered, "not my property." Orinda sat down beside him. "And if you wanted to keep her here," she added quietly, "there has always been a method at your disposal." Orinda patted his knee with her left hand, waggling her wedding rings at him as she did.

"It worked so well for you," Draco smarted back. "Where is Aiden today?" he asked her.

"He's in Holyhead," Orinda answered plainly. "He'll get here if the match is over in time."

"See," he pointed out, "you're married and that doesn't keep Aiden where you can reach him."

"Aye," Orinda allowed. "But I knew that going in. I took the flying instructor job at Hogwarts knowing full and well that I married a Quidditch player. And you're talking about proposing to a Healer," she added. "If you're really wanting to spend your life with Emily then you may have to be prepared for her to run off to Calcutta or Soweto or anyplace else with needy orphans. It's what you get for loving someone with such a big heart."

"It still stinks," he asserted.

"Maybe it does," Orinda allowed. "But you're just going to have to deal with it." Draco scowled at her. She wasn't the one who was going to have to be all alone for the next month. "Now," Orinda added, shoving him sideways, "get up off your arse and wish your baby sister a happy birthday."

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Let me know you were here. L/N stuff in the next chapter and wait 'til you see what Draco is up to. :)


	2. Chapter 2

DISCLAIMER in chapter1.

Here's more. Please review... love to all of my readers. :) -MQ

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"Both of your daughters are asleep, Mrs. Malfoy," Lucius shared with his wife as he ducked back into the private library where she was reading. "That means I have you all to myself." Lucius crossed quickly to the chair where Narcissa was sitting and bent down to kiss her cheek.

"And what of our son?" she asked, taking Lucius by the hand and guiding him into the chair next to hers.

"He has gone to town," Lucius answered her, sitting back in the chair and crossing his ankle over his knee.

"Without Lilith?" Narcissa asked, sounding almost as amazed as she was. Draco had been invaluable to them in his willingness and ability to look after his one year-old sister, but he had been dragging about the house for the past several days and his parents had done everything in their power to cheer him. Only little Lilith seemed to pull Draco from the funk he'd been in.

"All by himself," Lucius answered her. "I managed to convince him that it was in his best interest to get out of the house for a little while."

"I wish he weren't so miserable," Narcissa sighed, reaching over to take her husband's hand again. "Ten days without Emily and he's a completely different person. I'm terribly worried about him."

"Oh don't be," Lucius insisted. "She'll be back in three weeks and everything will be well again. It's good for him to realize how miserable he is while she's gone."

"And why is that?" Narcissa asked, defensively. She saw no reason for her son to ever be miserable.

"Darling," Lucius addressed his wife, "If I were to be away from you for a month I would go mad," he said. "And when we were young…"

"When we were young, Lucius Malfoy," Narcissa interrupted him, turning in her seat to look him in the eye. "When we were young you were in the service of a certain Dark Lord and I never knew when we parted company if I would see you again in an hour or in a month. And it drove me crazy."

"And I ached for your company every moment I was away," Lucius said back to her, sliding off of his chair to kneel at her feet.

"You're a terrible liar, Lucius Malfoy," she joked with him. "You never pined for me the way Draco is for this girl."

"You have no idea," he told her, stretching up to kiss his wife. "I missed you dreadfully," he told her, "every moment I couldn't see you," he shared, standing up and perching on the arm of her chair, "it was like torture. But I couldn't let you know that." Lucius sat up as straight as he could to make his point.

"You could have," Narcissa said back to him, tilting her head to look him in the eye, "and it might have made me feel better about things." Lucius picked up his wife's hand and kissed it. "And perhaps you should tell Draco," she added.

"Tell him what?" Lucius asked.

"About how miserable it was for you to be away from me when we were their age," Narcissa answered him. "I think he feels like he's the only person to ever feel this way. Maybe it would help him to know that you've felt just the same way."

"Perhaps," Lucius allowed. He didn't exactly like the idea of having that talk with his son, but he couldn't stand the idea of Draco spending the next three weeks moping around their house either. "But I think I would prefer to speak with him about Emily."

"About Emily?" Narcissa repeated.

"He hasn't come to you to discuss proposing, has he?" Lucius asked. Narcissa shook her head.

"No," she admitted. "He hasn't said anything to me about that, save a conversation just after Lilith was born about wanting to look at a ring. I thought he might have spoken with you."

"He hasn't," Lucius told her, letting go of her hand and standing up.

"You think he hasn't thought it through?" Narcissa half asked, half accused.

"I do wonder," Lucius answered her as he crossed to the side table and poured himself a drink from the decanter that the house elves kept filled. "What if he hasn't?"

"That could be dreadful," Narcissa answered, gesturing to her husband that she would like a drink as well. "You know he's madly in love with this girl," she added. "What's to be done if she doesn't pass muster?"

"Yes…?" Lucius repeated under his breath as he poured his wife a drink and closed up the decanter, "What indeed."

"Should we look into this ourselves?" Narcissa asked, taking the proffered glass from his hand.

"Perhaps," Lucius allowed, settling himself back in to his chair. He took a long sip of scotch and shook his head. "How did we let it get this far, Cissa?" he asked.

"We were busy, Lucius," Narcissa answered plainly. "I was pregnant," she reminded him. Lucius chuckled. She had a point there. Lilith had been enough of a surprise, but the fact that she was only eight weeks old when they discovered there was another baby on the way was enough to boggle the minds of any couple.

"And I suppose we couldn't have seen this coming," Lucius added.

"No," Narcissa agreed. "We really couldn't have." She shook her head and took a sip from her glass. "Pansy Parkinson," she mentioned, "Astoria Greengrass," Narcissa shrugged, "I wasn't terribly fond of either one of them, and you know I hate Ivy Parkinson and the thought of her daughter marrying my son turned my stomach, but at least their bloodlines were well known and appropriate."

"And Emily is Irish," Lucius felt the need to state the obvious. "And never has there been a more slovenly nation of record keepers," he commented.

"Amen to that," Narcissa agreed. "But we need to do something," she added. "He's going to come to me all bright eyed and hopeful and tell me that he's proposed- or that he's just about to- and I cannot in good conscience tell him to think twice about that. But at the same time…" her voice trailed off.

"At the same time you are still Narcissa Black Malfoy and you still care that the progenitors of your grandchildren are equally pure of blood on both sides," Lucius finished for her.

"Is that awful of me?" she asked, sipping again at her drink.

"No, dearest," Lucius answered her, "it's not awful. It's natural. It's just not anything we had thought to prepare for. Draco was in Slytherin and never passed any time with any young ladies of questionable parentage. How were we to know that he'd fall for an Irish Healer?"

"And do you know what the worst part is?" Narcissa asked him, "do you know what keeps me up nights?"

"What?" Lucius asked. He didn't like the idea of anything keeping Narcissa up nights and he would do anything that he could to quiet any tempest in her mind.

"The thought of intervening," she said back. "The thought that my only son has found a happiness I have always wanted for him and that we may have to encourage him to abandon that happiness. I always thought that Draco would marry for love, Lucius. We did. I don't want to take that from him for reasons of blood. It just feels wrong." Lucius shook his head and stood up again.

"I know, love," he said, crossing to stand behind her chair and take her hand. "I don't want to take that from him either. But there are larger concerns at work here," he reminded her. "Come," he beckoned, stepping in front of her chair and pulling her gently to her feet. "I will discuss this matter with Draco when he returns. Perhaps he knows something we don't. He is still our son, Narcissa; he would certainly have considered her ancestry."

"You'll speak with him?" she asked. Lucius nodded and pulled her into an easy embrace.

"Yes, my pet," he answered her, "I will deal with the question of Miss Flinders and her potentially questionable ancestry. You just be glad that your children are healthy and happy and safe at home."

"All right darling," Narcissa agreed. "I trust you'll take care of it." Lucius tightened his grip on his wife and swallowed hard. He could only hope he was able to.

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Please review... please. This is me begging. I haven't written anything in a long time and I'm longing for feedback. More Draco next chapter. He is a very bad boy.


	3. Chapter 3

DISCLAIMER in chapter 1. ADDITION TO DISCLAIMER: I don't own dengue fever either and I don't want it.

This Chapter rated K+ for alcohol use

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Draco sat at the bar in Curves' Corner in KnockturnAlley and scowled across the room at a new arrival. "You're late," he informed Orinda Lynch flatly as she joined him at the counter.

"Nice of you to notice," she said back, "your concern as to my whereabouts is quite touching." Orinda wrinkled her nose at him and bumped him with her shoulder.

"Shut up," Draco told her.

"You started it," she reminded him.

"Aiden's not with you?" Draco asked after her husband by way of changing the subject.

"Aiden's in Tel Aviv," she answered with a shrug.

"Tel Aviv?" Draco repeated, "really?"

"Something about Jews versus Catholics," Orinda answered, "I'm not entirely sure," she admitted, "but I can assure you that it has something to do with Quidditch." Draco chuckled. They did have an unconventional marriage.

"So it's just the two of us then?" Draco asked her. It wasn't so much that he minded hanging out with just Orinda for the night; in fact, she was the one person he might be able to steer into talking about Emily for most of the night.

"Actually," she answered, "I can't stay." Draco shook his head. It had taken everything his father had to convince him to leave the house and try to have a life while Emily was away and now the only friend he could talk into going out with him wasn't even going to stick around.

"What the hell?" Draco asked her.

"Sorry," Orinda offered. "McGonagall cornered me on the way out tonight. You know she's retiring, right? Well, she has an interview with a potential replacement tomorrow morning and needs me to proctor an exam with her OWL students."

"So why'd you come at all?" Draco asked glumly. London was an awfully long way for her to have come to not stay out drinking.

"I hate to be the bearer of bad news," she said back to him, signaling the bartender with a wave of her hands, "but I've come to be the bearer of bad news." She put one hand on Draco's arm and informed him, "You need a drink." The bartender greeted them just then and Draco relented to her insistence. After all, he had come here to drink in the first place.

"I'll have a pint of cider," he told the barkeep.

"No," Orinda insisted. "I meant you need a drink," she reiterated. Then to the bartender she said, "He'll have the best Irish Whiskey you've got with a splash of water and make it a double. I'll have the same."

"Wow," Draco said to her as the bartender went about getting to their drinks. "What is this bad news you've got to get me drunk for?"

"I got a letter from Emily," she answered him.

"That's not such bad news," he replied, scooting to the edge of his seat and turning further to face her. "Except that she hasn't sent a letter to me."

"I know," Orinda answered him. "She wanted me to talk to you," she added.

"About what?" Draco was getting suspicious.

"Emily's not coming home in three weeks," Orinda answered as their drinks were set in front of them.

"No," Draco agreed, taking a swig of the whiskey his friend had ordered him, "she's coming home in nineteen days," he corrected her. Draco knew how long a month was and how long Emily had been gone already. She would be home nineteen days from now.

"Not so much," Orinda corrected him. She clinked her glass against his. "There's been a dengue fever outbreak and she's going to be longer than she expected."

"A what?" Draco almost fell off of his bar stool.

"An epidemic of dengue hemorrhagic fever," Orinda answered back. "A really bad outbreak," she clarified. "Emily says it's horrible. And she and Dr. Bradenberg are planning to stay until they get it under control. She could be gone for months." Draco knocked back what was left in his glass.

"You had better not be bloody joking me," he insisted, letting his head drop onto the bar. "Because if you're bloody joking with me I will bloody kill you."

"I'm not joking mo chroi," she said back to him, using the private nickname she had given him in his fourth year at Hogwarts. "She'll be in touch." Orinda took another sip from her glass and then slid it toward Draco's hand. "But I've got to go. I'll see you soon," she added, ruffling his hair with one hand as she stood up and walked away.

Damn. It was taking everything Draco had to manage living nay sort of life for the month that Emily was supposed to be gone. Now he was going to have to survive even longer? He didn't like that one bit. Draco shook his head and polished off the liquor Orinda had left him with before raising the glass in the direction of the bartender so that it could be filled again.

"The hell is the matter with you?" Draco heard a very familiar and yet unwelcome voice call from the seat that Orinda had just vacated. Could this night get any worse?

"Hello Tori," Draco greeted the young lady who had just seated herself beside him. He had dated Astoria Greengrass for the better part of a year before Lilith was born. She was the younger sister of one of his Hogwarts classmates and had been a pleasant enough distraction after the war. The two had parted on amicable terms and the truth was that had he not been so miserableand down about Emily's absence growing longer he might have been happy to see her.

"And again I ask," Tori addressed him, taking his newly filled glass from the bartender and placing it into his hand, "What's the matter?" she finished. Draco shrugged and took a drink.

"Just got some bad news is all," he replied, trying at once to satisfy her and to give her a kind brush off.

"Sorry to hear that," Tori answered sincerely. "How've you been otherwise?" she asked, obviously not getting his hint to go away.

"Can't complain, really," Draco answered. The truth was, he _could_ complain; about Emily and about his friends being too busy to spend time with him and about his parents feeling the need to beget two little sisters in the space of a year and therefore throwing his entire life into turmoil. But he wasn't about to say any of that to an ex girlfriend out late at a bar.

"That's good," Tori said back genuinely. Draco had forgotten that she was truly a nice person and he was beginning to be happy he ran in to her. "Are you still seeing…?" Tori frowned, "Professor Lynch's friend?" she finally asked, obviously embarrassed at not remembering the name.

"Emily," Draco filled in the blank for her. "And yes," he added, "we're still together."

"That's wonderful," Tori said. It seemed odd to Draco, but he couldn't hear even an iota of sarcasm in her voice. It seemed as though she was truly happy that he was happy. Draco wasn't so sure he could handle a person with no ulterior motives at the moment. "And where is she tonight?" Tori asked. Draco could feel his face fall with her question. "Or is that having to do with the substance of the bad news you've just gotten?"

"Spot on, Tori," he affirmed. "She is in Calcutta," he shared. "And it seems as though she'll be there for the foreseeable future."

"Calcutta?" Tori repeated the word as if it were an oath. Draco nodded.

"She's a Healer," he explained. "And apparently there is some sort of outbreak of something. So Emily is in Calcutta wiping the noses of orphans with the clap or some like."

"Sounds dreadful," Tori commiserated.

"I'm sure it is dreadful," Draco agreed. "And yet she is there and I am here and that makes things here dreadful too."

"She's off in some third world epidemic to tend to impoverished orphans?" Tori half asked half affirmed. Draco nodded; he couldn't have put it better himself. "Bloody Hufflepuff," Tori accused. Draco frowned.

"Emily didn't go to Hogwarts," he reminded his ex.

"Oh, I know," Astoria allowed, "but if she had…" Tori shrugged her shoulders as Draco's frown became more pronounced.

He had never thought about that. Slytherin had always been a sort of litmus test for him and the friends he made and the girls he dated. Even Astoria had been a Ravenclaw and the sister of a Slytherin. He surely wouldn't have ever become friends with Orinda had she not been sorted into Slytherin when she'd come to Hogwarts for post graduate work. He had never been friendly with any Hufflepuff.

And it had never occurred to him that Emily could have been one. He thought it mightily bizarre that the young lady he swore he was in love with and had spent several months contemplating a marriage proposal to might be the kind of person he wouldn't have given the time of day to when he was in school. That little tidbit- and it was true as sure as Tori had said it- did not sit well with him. Draco drained the contents of his recently refilled glass of whiskey.

"You Ravenclaws are too smart for my own good, you know that, Tori?" he asked her, aware that the liquor was beginning to hit him and not bothering to care so much.

"Don't I know it?" Tori asked by way of response. "Have another drink, Malfoy," she offered, motioning to the bartender, "bad news pars best with brown alcohol."

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See where this is going now? If only Draco had thought ahead and not fallen for a nice Irish girl. Didn't we like him better with Pansy? More wondering as to Emily's blood line and Draco's blood alcohol level tomorrow. It's almost 2 in the morning and I am going to sleep now. Please let me know what you're thinking... the reviews get me out of bed in the morning.

-MQ (getting over pneumonia, which always inspires me to write Malfoys)


	4. Chapter 4

DISCLAIMER in chapter 1.

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By the time Draco reached his parents' front door he was stumbling so badly that he wondered as to his ability to get up the stairs. He was actively second guessing his decision not to take Tori up on her offer to walk him to the door. It was bad enough that he had drunk himself into a stupor, but through the haze in his mind he was just able to remember that he and Tori had had a well and proper snog sometime between the fifth shot of whiskey and his need to get a breath of fresh air.

That was bad.

But so was the feeling in Draco's stomach as he leaned against Narmin, the Malfoys' chief house elf, to keep his balance as he struggled up the grand staircase. His head was still swimming at the thought of his having kissed Tori and all he wanted was to get to his bed and forget all about this whole night. He was in love with Emily, he had only kissed Astoria because he was drunk and upset and lonely and it would never happen again. And also never again would he trust Orinda Lynch with ordering the drinks.

"Draco," he heard his father's voice call from the formal living room off the mezzanine. Great. Even through the liquor he could identify the tone of his father's voice as beckoning him to a conversation of some weight. He could not guess what it was that his father might want to discuss with him after midnight nor did he think he had anything approaching the mental faculties to survive such a conversation.

Then again, avoiding Lucius Malfoy in his own house was about as real a possibility as putting one's hand in the mouth of a dragon and getting it back in its original condition. Draco rolled his eyes and steered Narmin toward the door to the living room. Just as they reached the door, Draco managed to stand himself up straight and walk through the door toward the sound of his father's beckoning.

"Sir?" Draco addressed Lucius as he came further into the living room. Lucius was seated on the long Chippendale sofa facing the door and he patted the seat next to him, signaling Draco to sit as well.

"Come sit down, son," Lucius invited. "We have a few things to discuss."

"Right," Draco agreed, moving across the room and taking his father up on his offer of a seat. "Orinda got me drunk," he shared quietly with as little slur in his voice as he could manage. "I don't know if 'discuss' is within my realm of possibilities right now," he admitted. Lucius Malfoy chuckled.

"Oh to be young again," he sighed, rising from his seat and crossing to a small table in the far corner of the room. "And how are the Lynches?" Lucius asked as he pulled open a drawer and examined its contents.

"Aiden ran off to Tel Aviv and Orinda could only stay for a moment," Draco answered his father, still bitter at the fact that his friends hadn't been there tonight and that he would never have kissed Astoria Greengrass had they been there to watch after him.

"Kibbitt!" Lucius called into the air, summoning another of the Malfoys' house elves. With a _crack_ and in an instant the chubby elf was standing before her master. Lucius addressed his servant, "Kibbitt, have we anything to soak the alcohol off of my son's brain?" he asked. The little elf nodded and snapped her fingers. Into her hand appeared an oval shaped silver tray with what looked like tea biscuits and a demitasse of espresso on it. Lucius took the tray from her and dismissed the elf with a nod. Another _crack_ and she was gone again. "Eat these," Lucius instructed his son as he passed the tray to Draco and sat down again on the far end of the sofa.

Draco took the tray and began nibbling at one of the biscuits. It didn't taste like much, but almost instantly he could feel himself beginning to sober up. "Wow," he said to his father, nodding his head and taking a sip from the demitasse mug.

"They're snap-to's," Lucius explained. "The potion in those can sober a wizard up almost instantly. You'll be thinking clearly enough to sign a financial instrument in no time." Draco smiled at his father; now it made sense what these were doing in the house.

"I'll have to remember about these," Draco commented, scarfing down the second cookie and delighting in the feeling of his head clearing so rapidly.

"You would be wise to do so," Lucius agreed. "And I will take from that comment that you feel well again?" he added. "We can have this conversation?" Draco nodded as he took another sip of espresso.

"Mum's asleep?" he asked his father. He felt the need to be prepared if this conversation, whatever it was that had to be discussed at midnight, was going to also involve his less-than-healthy mother.

"Yes," Lucius answered him. "I still don't know just how I feel about muggle medicine," he commented, "but Dr. Bradenberg gave her some pain killers that really kill the pain. She's sleeping quite well these days."

"Good," Draco affirmed. One less thing to worry about was a very good thing.

"But it's not your mother I wish to discuss," Lucius said, steering the conversation back to its original purpose.

"What is it, then?" Draco asked, placing his cup back onto its saucer on the tray between himself and his father.

"What do you know about Emily Flinders?" Lucius asked. Draco frowned. What the hell was his father getting at?

"I know she's in bloody Calcutta for the foreseeable future," he snapped back. Tori's words echoed in his mind '_bloody Hufflepuff'._

"That's not what I meant," Lucius corrected him. "I mean what do you know of her," he reiterated. Of her family," he clarified.

"Met her parents I think," Draco answered, confused as to what this conversation was about. "At Hartlestead's wedding," he added. "Emily was the maid of honor, her parents were there. In fact," he recalled, "I think I danced with her mother."

"Good," Lucius answered. "What do you remember of her mother?" he asked. Draco was shaking his head.

"She's left-handed," Draco offered. "Her wand pocket was on the right hand side."

"Good," Lucius said again.

"What are you getting at, dad?" Draco finally asked.

"Son," Lucius sighed, "How do I put this to you in a way you'll understand?" Lucius leaned back in his seat.

"Anything will be an improvement on right this minute," Draco pointed out.

"Draco," Lucius said plainly, "there are girls you marry and there are girls you have fun with. I am trying to discern, and to make you consider, which of these your Miss Flinders is."

"I don't think I like that," Draco said back to his father. "I don't like the sound of what I think it is you're accusing Emily of."

"I'm not accusing anyone of anything, son," Lucius answered back. "I am not saying a word as to her disposition and I'm not trying to say anything about the quality of your relationship with her. All I am asking, Draco, is if her bloodline qualifies her for being a marriageable young lady."

"Her bloodline?" Those words hit Draco like a ton of gold across the face. Emily's bloodline…? He had no idea. He knew that the Irish set very little store by such things; he knew even that Orinda wouldn't have known anything past her own parents' lineage had it not been for records kept by the Wizarding Circus that had employed her family for twelve generations. He didn't know anything at all about Emily's family. It hadn't ever mattered. He had met her in PartiAlley, a Wizarding district, and she was a magical Healer. And he was in love with her. That was all of her that had ever mattered.

He heard Tori's voice in his head again '_bloody Hufflepuff'._ He had never thought about it that way. He had no bloody idea as to Emily's lineage. But he was feeling like he had better do whatever he could to find out as soon as was humanly possible. And suddenly he was very afraid that what could be learned about Emily's family history might not be good enough to win over his father's approval.

"You heard me, son," Lucius said back. "I know you're serious about her and I don't want you jumping in to something that's inappropriate."

"I didn't know that was so important," Draco admitted. "I mean… after everything…." Hadn't they all just fought a war where the blood line argument had lost?

"It is and will remain important," Lucius insisted. "Your family must always be a consideration, Draco," he added. "And you should think very carefully before adding another member to it."

"Right," Draco answered. His head was swimming. He had to wonder if he had downed those snap-to cookies too quickly, as his mind was almost too clear. He hadn't ever thought about the way that matters of blood could affect matters of love. He kind of hated that.

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Reviews give me life and breath. More soon or tomorrow. :)

-MQ


	5. Chapter 5

DISCLAIMER in chapter 1.

Authors note: "Mo chroi", Orinda's standard nickname for Draco, is an Irish term: pronounced 'ma-crEE' and translates loosely to "my heart". It occurs to me that I hadn't explained that. So now you know.

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"Now would you mind telling me what in the devil we're doing here?" Orinda skirted behind Draco through the stacks of the main Ministry Library in London. "I haven't seen you go near a library since you left school."

"There's something I need to know," Draco said back to her in a voice a little louder than he should have used in a library.

"Could you keep it down?" she commented on his volume. "And what exactly is it that you need to know so badly that you had to drag me to London on a Saturday morning?"

"You're a history teacher," Draco said back to her, "and I need to know some history."

"I'm a flying teacher," she reminded him. She had gone to Hogwarts with the intention of becoming a History of Magic teacher and had even gone so far as to have her thesis accepted by the Board of Governors of Magical Education and spent a year at Trinity College in Dublin teaching History of Magic to muggle college students, but when the flying teacher job had opened at Hogwarts last year she had taken it and had not taught history since then.

"Yeah well," Draco defended, "You used to be a history teacher. And I know you know your way around a library."

"You're the one leading the way," she commented, grabbing at his sleeve to slow him down.

"Right," Draco allowed, stopping and turning to face her. "And I have no bloody clue what I'm doing in here anyway," he admitted.

"So you'll tell me what we're doing here now?" Orinda asked him. "I don't have all day, you know." Draco rolled his eyes. Of course she didn't.

"It's Saturday," he reminded her.

"And there's Quidditch at Hogwarts," she retorted. Draco shook his head. Had there ever been a Quidditch match this early in the year?

"You're bloody busy all the time," he complained. Orinda chuckled.

"You know, mo chroi," she said back to him, "some of us have to work for a living." Draco shook his head and rolled his eyes. "You should try it some time." Was she really suggesting that he get a job?

"The hell would I do?" he asked her.

"You're right," she answered back, "you're qualified for nothing. Sit on your aristocratic arse and be bored," she teased. "But I do have to get back, so why don't you tell me what in the 'h' we're looking for?" Draco shook his head. This library had seven hundred and forty levels and he wasn't even sure they were on the right one. And he was going to have to tell her some time; he really had brought her along because she had prepared her thesis in this library and if there was anyone in Britain he could trust to navigate this place it would be her.

"I need to know about Emily," he answered quietly.

"And you couldn't just ask me?" Orinda questioned. "You had to drag me to a library to ask me?"

"Not stuff that you'd know," he said back, "probably," he added by way of a qualifier. Orinda and Emily had known each other since they were little and there was really no telling just how much she actually knew.

"What are you saying, Draco?" she asked plainly. "What is it that you'd possibly need to know so badly?"

"Did you ever meet her grandparents?" he asked, scanning the stacks around him to try and get his bearings.

"At her first communion," Orinda answered, nodding her head.

"And what were they like?" he quizzed, taking hold of her arm and beginning to walk again.

"Very nice…what are you getting at?" Orinda snatched her arm back from his grasp and stopped moving. "I am not taking another bloody step until you tell me what you're after."

"Were they wizards, Orinda?" Draco snapped. "Were Emily's grandparents all magic users?" he clarified. "And what about their grandparents? And their grandparents?"

"What?" Orinda was frowning and shaking her head. Draco ran his hands through his hair and shook his head. He took a step back toward Orinda and took her by the shoulders.

"My dad's on my case, all right," he shared. "He's all worried that Emily's not pure blooded. He's gotten on me to think about if I'm going to propose then I need to know her whole family history."

"You're bloody kidding me," Orinda said back to him, incredulously.

"No, I'm really not," Draco assured her. "This is completely serious. Have you ever had a Death Eater after you about something?" he asked.

"There's no such thing as a Death Eater," Orinda reminded him quietly, careful to lower her voice even further as she said the words 'Death Eater'. "Not any more," she added.

"Well as much as that may be true," Draco half allowed, "this is my father we're talking about," he continued, "and there is no way he's going to let me marry anyone he doesn't approve of."

"Your father adores Emily," Orinda reminded him.

"That's not enough," he replied.

"How about you're in love with her?" she offered. "Is that not enough for him?"

"No," Draco answered plainly. "Love and marriage have absolutely nothing to with each other in my family."

"Bollocks," Orinda rebutted. "Your parents, who have had two babies in the space of the last year, are obviously madly in love with each other," she pointed out. "And there is no way in the world that you or anyone else is ever going to convince me that they married for blood."

"I never thought to ask," Draco allowed. "And thank you so much for bringing up my parents' love life. There are mental pictures a bloke just doesn't need." Orinda chuckled at him.

"Sorry 'bout that," she laughingly apologized. "But I mean it. I'll bet your parents would be very understanding if you'd just talk to them."

"You're delusional," Draco said back to her.

"And if you're really after getting into Emily's family history then you're in the wrong place," she informed him.

"What?" he asked, looking around at the stacks of books on Wizarding Genealogy that he had finally found his way to.

"Emily was born in Dublin," Orinda reminded him. "In fact, her entire family save her one British uncle and cousin Molly are all Irish. We're not going to find a thing here in London."

"Damn," Draco said loudly enough to elicit a shushing sound from an elderly librarian a few yards away. "Damn," he said again, quieter this time.

"Calm down!" Orinda insisted. She pulled him into a nearby corner and shook him by his shoulders. "Now," she began sternly, "I have no idea why it is that suddenly the entire history of Emily's family has become such an issue with your father. He's not the one who's going to marry her. But seeing as it has become an issue, I would suggest that you bloody well ask Emily."

"Emily," Draco snapped, "is not here." He shook his head and rolled his eyes. "And on top of that how do you think she would take that conversation?" he asked. "Emily dear," he began in a quieter tone, "I am considering seriously a proposal of marriage but before I do that I have to see to it that your entire blood heritage is properly vetted. Are there any muggles hiding in your family tree that I should know about?" Draco grimaced. That didn't even sound good in theory.

"Yeah," Orinda conceded, "that would go over like a lead broomstick."

"Precisely," he insisted.

"If I help you find this out," she said to him, "and I'm not saying I will. But if I help you find out what you want to know, you have to tell me what you're going to do if things don't turn out the way you want them to. What are you going to do if her great grandparents on one side were muggles, Draco?"

"I…." Draco sucked in a tense breath. He hadn't really gotten that far. His whole purpose in this searching had been to prove that Emily was as pure of blood as any other girl he had ever dated. He hadn't ever let his mind get to a place where he might find out the opposite. "I don't know," he admitted.

Would he try and hide that…? See what he could do about keeping any bad news from his parents and marry Emily anyway? Could he do that to his parents? Could he stand the thought of his own children having undesirable ancestry? Could he lie to his mother and his father and his baby sisters? Could he even love a mudblood? Draco shuddered at the thought that he might have fallen in love with a half blood or worse. But then he couldn't imagine the thought of living without Emily. Did that make him a blood traitor? This was bad.

"Well," Orinda said back to him, "you figure that out," she instructed, "and maybe I'll help you." She looked him square in the eye and her face became very stern. "But I will not be a party to your aristocratic prejudices breaking my best friend's heart," she informed him. Draco nodded.

He hoped it wouldn't come to that. But he had a lot of thinking to do.

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More soon. Please keep reviews coming. Cheers! -MQ


	6. Chapter 6

DISCLAIMER in chapter 1

for notwolf who always clicks that review button. :)

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"You look awful," Andromeda Tonks told her nephew as the house elves cleared the dinner table. Draco, for his part, stayed in his seat and watched as his father helped his mother toward the stairs. "You're worried about your mother?" she asked, presuming as to his sour state. Draco shook his head but it was clear that An wasn't buying it. "She's doing really well," she assured him. "Muggle women have caesarians all the time. She'll be completely herself again before you know it."

"It's not that," Draco said back, turning in his seat to face his aunt.

"We'll have coffee in the drawing room," Andromeda announced to whatever elf might have been listening. She stood from her chair and motioned for Draco to follow her. He stood as well and moved with her through the door and toward the drawing room. "So what is it, then?" An asked her nephew as they passed through the pocket doors and into the purple swathed room. Draco shrugged his shoulders. Might as well be honest; nobody else had thought to want to listen to him in weeks.

"It's Emily," he admitted.

"How is she?" An asked, sitting down in one of the wingback chairs.

"Okay, I guess," he answered. "She writes," he added.

"You miss her dreadfully?" An asked him. Draco nodded. He did miss Emily dreadfully, but he wasn't about to go into that with his aunt. Andromeda had lost her husband of almost twenty five years during the war and he didn't figure his missing Emily would seem all that critical to her.

"It's not that, either," he shared, flopping into the chair opposite his aunt. Just then Kibbitt popped in and left a tray of coffee and biscuits on the low table before disappearing again.

"Well, are you going to tell me?" An asked. Draco shrugged.

"I can't decide if I want to propose," he told his aunt.

"That's the craziest thing I've ever heard," she told him. "I've seen the way you look at her," she added, "I know you want to propose. So the question is: what's stopping you?" An cocked her head to one side, "other than the obvious problem of her being in Calcutta and your being here," she added.

"Don't know her history," he answered. "Don't know her blood line."

"And you're worried about that?" An asked, reaching out to pour the both of them a cup of coffee from the silver carafe. Draco nodded. It occurred to him that maybe Andromeda wasn't the person to talk to about this. Then again, she might have been the most sympathetic member of the entire family. After all, she had married for love with no consideration for blood. Granted- that had gotten her disowned and blasted off of the family tree and shunned by her entire community. Maybe she'd understand both sides of his dilemma.

"Can't marry her without provenance of pure blooded ancestry," he said glumly. "But there isn't any out there, not that I can find," he added. Orinda had gone against her word and looked into Emily's heritage even without an answer from him as to what he might do if the news didn't turn out to be what he wanted. Unfortunately there hadn't been much news at all.

"Is that your prejudice, or your father's?" Andromeda asked plainly. Draco shrugged.

"Is there really any difference?" he asked.

"I just want to know where this is coming from," she answered.

"I guess it's both," Draco admitted. "I mean…" he continued, "dad brought it up, and I hadn't really ever thought about that until he did. But the truth is that I can't imagine being married to someone who isn't a pure blood witch. It just won't do. But then I stop to think about it and I love Emily and I wonder if that would change at all if I found out that she wasn't a pure blooded witch. And on top of that…"

"On top of that you're wondering why the big emphasis on marrying for blood when everyone you know married for love," An finished his sentence for him.

"Sort of," Draco allowed. "But maybe they didn't. Do you know?" he asked. "I'm scared to ask. My father seems to want me to think that he and mum married for blood. "

"Don't you believe that for one split second, Draco," An instructed, leaning back in her seat again and beginning to sip at her coffee. "Your father had his eye on my baby sister from the time she was fifteen. She hexed a boy in the Great Hall for having lousy table manners and Lucius was smitten from that moment on. And I happen to know that your mother turned down four perfectly good proposals from four perfectly eligible and perfectly pure blooded gentlemen because she had her heart set on marrying your father. My parents once told my sisters and me that to marry for love was to marry for all the wrong reasons and yet my parents themselves married for love as did all three of their daughters."

"But you," Draco reminded her, "married for love without regard for blood and you see what it got you."

"A great deal of heartache and a near quarter century without my family," An declared plainly. "I do understand that argument. But I also got a husband who adored me, a daughter who I was nothing but proud of, and now a reunion with my family and a grandson who is absolutely wonderful."

"But it took a whole war to get that reunion," he said.

"True," Andromeda agreed. "And I can't say my life with Ted was all wine and roses," she allowed, "but I don't regret it. I think I would have regretted having done anything else."

"What was that like?" Draco asked. "If you don't mind telling me," he qualified. It occurred to him that he was asking her for some very personal information. She was his mother's sister, but he had only known her for a little more than two years and he wasn't sure she would be comfortable sharing intimate details of her life with him. "What was it like for you, having been raised a Black, with the same attitudes in your house that we always had in ours… how was it that you even reconciled that with the fact that you were in love with a mu…" he stopped himself before using the epithet that was halfway out of his mouth, "muggle born?" he finally finished.

"It wasn't easy," she admitted, "and I don't mind telling you." An took a sip from her mug and then set the cup and saucer on her knee. "Ted and I started as a frivolous affair," she confessed. "He was cute, and he was easily manipulated quite frankly. He was just one of half a dozen boys I was passing time with back then. And I was in sixth year; there was nothing serious going on anywhere. Everyone was just shagging whomever they wanted." Draco was frowning; he wasn't sure he liked the idea of his parents or his aunts and uncles 'shagging whomever'. "You've got to remember it was the seventies," she added, "things were a little different then. "But I liked Ted and we…" she looked for an appropriately delicate way to say what she was getting at. "We enjoyed each other's company," she finally settled on. "By the time I knew I was in love with him I was in real trouble. I couldn't tell anybody. Because, unlike you and your issue with not knowing Emily's heritage, everyone was well aware of the fact that both of Ted's parents were muggles."

"But you didn't want to fall in love with him?" Draco asked. An shook her head.

"I certainly didn't set out to," she admitted.

"Did it freak you out a little?" he asked. "Was it weird to think that you were in love with someone who you had raised to think of as dirty?"

"Is that what you're feeling?" she asked. Draco nodded his head.

"A little," he admitted. "I wonder if I'm going to look at Emily differently if I find out that she isn't pure blooded."

"You're worried that you'll hate yourself for going against everything your parents believe in?" she surmised.

"Yeah," he allowed. "And I wonder what it would do to my mother. What would she think? I couldn't break her heat like that. But then again I don't want to break Emily's heart either. I hope it doesn't come to that choice, but as my father would say: hope is not a plan. What am I going to do?"

"You're right about hope not being a plan," An agreed. "And you've got to decide which is more important," she added. "Which means more to you: the fact that you love Emily, or if her heritage means that she won't fit in to your family? That's a very big decision."

"How did you make it?" he asked her. "What was it that made you decide to marry Ted? Did somehow all of your misgivings disappear, or was there some moment when you realized that being in love with him was more important than every other consideration."

"I had a harder decision," An shared. "I found out I was pregnant right before we left school," she told him. "So my hand was forced a little bit. I honestly can't say I know what I'd have done eventually had I been left to think about it indefinitely."

"Wow," Draco answered. "I didn't know that." An nodded. "But you were with him, knowing he was a muggle, and that didn't bother you?"

"Again," she answered, "it was just for sport," she told him. "I was just having fun. I was young and rich and the queen of the world as far as I was concerned and I could have any fun I wanted to at anyone's expense. I didn't mean to fall in love with Ted," she asserted. "I meant to get my jollies and never think twice about him. It just didn't happen that way. The heart wants what it wants, Draco," Andromeda shared. "Just follow your heart."

Draco sighed. If only it were as easily done as said.

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If ever there were a person with an opinion... right?

More later or maybe tomorrow. Keep reviewing. :)

-MQ


	7. Chapter 7

DISCLAIMER in chapter 1.

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"I was hoping you'd be here," Huh? Draco turned around at the sound of the familiar voice. It had been a long trip via PortKey to get here and his head was still a little swimmy from the process.

"You were?" he asked before he had turned around fully. He knew who it was at once. Light brown hair and sparkling hazel eyes and a smile that told him she'd been into the punch early; it was Tori Greengrass. "Really?" he asked her once they were facing each other. Tori smiled at him.

"I need a partner for Wizard Pong," she told him. "And you're the co-world champion." Draco laughed at that. He hadn't played Wizard Pong, or any drinking game for that matter, since the World Cup of Drinking party at during the Quidditch World Cup the summer after he left Hogwarts. Hence the world championship; Draco had come into the game at the last minute as Viktor Krum's partner when Vlad Marinov had gone off with a girl just before the final round. He didn't remember having told Tori about that, but then again there were three hundred people at that party and who knows who might have said something to her.

"I'm not drinking tonight," he answered her. He had come to this party because it was Blaise Zabini's twenty-first birthday and he was thrilled beyond belief to have something to do other than sit around his own house or his parents' missing Emily or trying to figure out how to know for sure that he wasn't making the biggest possible mistake by being involved with her. Add to that the fact that Blaise's mother was currently involved with some American magical entrepreneur and that Draco had never been to New York before and the party sounded like a welcome distraction. But he wasn't here to get blasted.

He was especially not going to get hammered with Tori here. The last time he had become inebriated in the presence of Astoria Greengrass, they had engaged in some very inappropriate behavior and that was not something he felt was worth repeating.

"You're kidding," Tori said back to him with a frown. "You can't come to a party of Zabini's without getting a little bit bevvied," she insisted, "I don't think it's allowed. And anyway," she added, threading her arm through his, "I'd bet even money that you came here to have a good time. I'd bet that you really need a good time. Seeing as I'm not seeing anyone here with you," Tori continued, "then I'm going to guess that your girlfriend is still off in fever land tending to the unwashed masses. And seeing as I haven't seen you out at pub nor club in weeks I'll also guess that you've been bored off your bits. And I must say that just because everyone else in the world is all busy with their higher purposes and gainful employment that does not mean that you have to be stuck with nothing to do all the time. And there is absolutely no reason you can't have fun at a party."

"You may have a point," he answered back. It was true that all he had done for weeks was mope around one manor house or the other writing Emily letters to which he rarely got more than a one line reply and trying to teach Lilith how to ride her toy broomstick or pronounce her full name. That was no life. He used to have fun, he remembered that. It had just been a while. In fact, it had been more than a year since he'd really been out and had a good time. Once he had gotten involved with Emily the partying and carousing had stopped wholesale. But he had liked his life before then and he couldn't see any reason not to have fun at this party seeing as he was here already. Hell- he was the reigning co-world champion of Wizard Pong.

Plus, he had to admit to himself that it felt really nice to be asked. It had been a while since anyone had paid any real attention to him. His parents had been busy with the baby girls, not that he blamed them, but it still hadn't been what he was used to. This 'no longer being an only child' thing was a little harder than he had imagined it to be. Top that off with the fact that Gregory Goyle was living in New Orleans, Orinda was constantly busy at Hogwarts, Aiden was all over the globe playing for Portree, Krum and his cronies were back in Eastern Europe and Emily was still nursing the poor and pitiable in Calcutta and he had been lonelier in the past several weeks than ever before in his life. It felt really good to have someone paying attention to him; even if it was Tori Greengrass. It was nice to have someone care that he was having a good time.

"I'll warn you," he said to her, taking a step in the direction she was trying to pull him, "I was a last minute pinch hitter at the World Cup of Drinking," he explained. "I may not be as good as you want me to be."

"But you'll play?" she asked hopefully, guiding him toward the spiral staircase in the center of the penthouse where the party was being held.

"I'll play," he agreed, smiling at her. He kind of loved it that she seemed so happy to have him along. Tori led him up the stairs and into a large white room with turquoise and magenta up-light and one glass wall that opened onto a balcony where there was already a huge crowd amassed to watch mixed doubles Wizard Pong.

"I'll get you a drink," Tori offered, "be right back." Draco nodded. She was getting him a drink. No one ever got him a drink any more. He had been getting his own drinks since he left school; unless of course there were house elves to do it.

"Malfoy!" he heard his name called from the direction of the bar. He looked over to see Gregory Goyle wading through the crowd in his direction.

"Goyle!" he greeted his old friend with a handshake. "Good to see you here, mate," he said.

"You as well," Goyle said back to him.

"How've you been?" Draco asked, moving with Goyle over to a sofa against the near wall and sitting.

"Good," Gregory answered, "can't complain, anyway," he amended.

"Keeping busy?" Draco asked. It wasn't that he cared so much as to what Goyle had been doing with himself in the time since he'd relocated to do his parents' business in America, but Draco realized that it felt really good to be around old friends.

"Very busy," Goyle answered. "I wasn't sure I could get away for the party," he added, "but when an old mate from home throws a party on this continent I kind of feel like I should go." Draco nodded.

"Draco!" he heard his name called again and looked away from Goyle to see Pansy Parkinson scurrying his way with Ashleigh Mitton and Roger Davies in tow. Draco smiled up at them.

"Hey!" he greeted the group, standing to shake Davies' hand and patting each of the girls on their arms. "Good to see you!"

"Where have you been keeping yourself?" Ashleigh asked as she and Pansy settled into an oversized chair adjacent to the sofa. "We never see you," she added. Draco shrugged. How long had it been since he had seen any of his old schoolmates?

"It's really good to see you," Pansy added. Draco smiled at her. He and Pansy had not parted on the best of terms and he was a little bit surprised that she wasn't being completely hateful to him. But then he spotted a little diamond ring on her left hand and realized that she was probably over the bad teenage love affair that had ended more than two years ago.

"It's good to see you," Draco echoed.

"I see you found everyone," Tori said to him as she entered the circle and handed over a tall glass of bubbling red liquor.

"We found him," Ashleigh said back. "Is Daffy here?" Ashleigh asked Tori, referring to her older sister Daphne by her old nickname.

"No," Tori answered, seating herself beside Draco on the sofa. "Is that ok?" she asked Draco of his drink. He nodded. It was good, and how long had it been since anyone had asked him that? "It's Eric's parents' wedding anniversary and they're stuck at the party."

"That blows," Goyle commented.

"Would have been nice to have seen her," Draco said to Tori. He had no idea who this 'Eric' person was that Daphne was seeing so seriously that she was stuck at his parents' anniversary party. He felt remarkably out of touch.

"I'll tell her you asked after her," Tori said to Draco and to Ashleigh. "Where's Pucey?" She asked Pansy.

"He's on the deck," Pansy answered, "playing mixed doubles wizard pong with Liese."

"You loan him out for drinking tournaments?" Goyle asked with a chuckle.

"Adrian likes to win," Pansy answered him, "and I am terrible. He'd have wanted to play with you," she directed at Tori, "but I see you brought in a ringer." Pansy chuckled and took a sip from her martini.

"I didn't know the world champion was coming," Tori swore, holding her hand up as though taking an oath. How many people had heard about that? "Millie!" Tori suddenly stood up and shouted, waving her hand at a young woman who'd just come in. She was tall and statuesque, with curves in all the right places and long wavy brown hair. That couldn't be…?

"Millie?" Draco asked Tori as she sat back down. That could not be Millicent Bulstrode. She was pretty. How did that happen? WHEN did that happen?

"Allo Tori," Millicent greeted as she joined the group, "ladies," she added in the direction of Pansy and Ashleigh, "Gregory," she added, squeezing herself onto the sofa beside Goyle. "Didn't know you were coming."

"Got away for the night," he said back. "Get you a drink?" he offered.

"Yeah," Millie answered, "thanks." Goyle stood up and excused himself. "Draco Malfoy," she added, punching him in the arm now that Goyle was no longer sitting between them. "How the hell have you been?"

"I'm good," he answered plainly. "I'm good," he repeated. "What about you?" he asked, "you look great."

"Oh, thanks," Millie said back, half rolling her eyes. "I forget I haven't seen you in forever. You know I'm working for _Witch Weekly_ now?" she asked. Draco shook his head. He hadn't known that. "I'm a photographer," she told him. "Spend enough time with fashion models and dress designers and it's bound to rub off." Draco smiled.

"Well, it looks good on you," he told her.

"Thanks," she answered.

"It's just like old times," Pansy announced, smiling, as Gregory slid back into his seat with a drink for Millicent. Draco smiled. It was, a little.

"Except Millie is all gorgeous now," Goyle commented.

"And Pansy and Ashleigh aren't gossiping about anybody," Millie added.

"And Tori and I are allowed into the clique," Roger injected.

"True that," Tori agreed, raising her glass and clinking it against his.

"And we don't need Hartlestead to buy us liquor or rent us hotel rooms," Goyle contributed.

"If you're talking about hotel rooms, Gregory," Millicent said to him, "I'm going to need more than this," she gestured to her drink.

_And Crabbe's not here_ ….Draco thought. But he didn't say anything. He didn't want to put a damper on anyone's good time. Maybe that was why he hadn't spent any time with his old friends since they left school. He had no idea how it was that his friends all seemed to have gotten over the war and all the trauma that had gone along with it. He had sought to distance himself from everything that reminded him of that awful time. These people were all sitting together and having a good time and wondering where the hell he had been.

He had to wonder that himself. This was one terrific party. There was music and dancing and two levels of bars and interesting lighting and beautiful women. Draco was even sure that he had recognized three members of the Wizard Rock band The Vexed Hexes on the other side of the room. This is what his life was supposed to be like; not moping lonely around his giant empty manor house and not buckling his baby sister's shoes. He didn't know what the war had done to him, but he realized that he wasn't over it yet.

And he didn't like that. What was it that all of these people had that he didn't that had allowed them to get on with their lives and had caused him to become so different from the person he always had been?

"You heard her, Goyle," Draco finally piped up, smiling at his old chum, determined to have the fun tonight that he should have been having since he was seventeen. "Get the lady another drink." He turned his head and looked back at Tori before adding, "and get her another one, too."

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Parties are fun, but dangerous. I bet you can guess where this might be going.... More soon. I love the review button, don't you? It's all Slytherin green and shiny; you should totally click that and type something in the little box that pops up- it'll be fun.

-MQ


	8. Chapter 8

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Draco felt dizzy. His hands were cold and his face was hot and his stomach was churning. The bile was rising up in his gut and he thought he was going to pass out. He had to get out of this flat. He had to get out of this town. He had to get to somewhere with a time turner and go back in time and tie himself up in a closet somewhere and keep himself from ever having gone to Blaise damnable Zabini's damnable birthday party.

He had known this would happen. He had feared this would happen anyway; been leery enough of the possibility that he had planned not to even drink at that party. But he had broken his own rule. He had gotten more than a little bit drunk at that party. And everyone had been there. All of his old friends and his school friends and a bunch of bloody celebrities and pretty girls and the Long Island Wave Quidditch team had all conspired against him.

He didn't mean to drink that much. He didn't mean to dance on the bar with Millicent Bulstrode and two of the Holyhead Harpies. He didn't mean to leave the party draped over Astoria Greengrass. And he certainly didn't mean to have spent the night with her.

But she had been so nice and she had paid so much attention to him. And she had smelled so good and she had looked so pretty. And it had been like old times; when he could do as he pleased with whomever he pleased and so he had done just that. He had done whatever he pleased all night long with his former flame.

He skulked out of Tori's London flat and into the hallway. Which way was out? This place was new. Tori still lived at home with her parents when they had dated. He didn't know his way around this building. He didn't know his way around his own skull at the moment. Was there a lift? Were they maybe on the ground floor? No. There had been stairs; he was sure that he definitely remembered stairs. He remembered falling on the stairs and hadn't he been wearing a jacket? No matter. If he had lost an item or two of clothing that was the absolute least of his worries.

He had to get out of here. He looked again from one end of the corridor to the other. That was the problem with magical apartments in muggle neighborhoods; they had to be well hidden, and once hidden there was always a trick to getting in and out of them. And Draco's mind had no room in it for tricks at the moment. He frowned and bit his lip before getting an idea.

"Ooble!" he whispered harshly the name of the house elf who had become his sole property upon moving in to the house in Coventry. "Ooble?" he repeated a little louder. With a _crack_ and in an instant, the little elf was standing before him with a somewhat confused look on her face. Draco couldn't so much blame her for her confusion. He had never called on her from outside of the house before. "Ooble can you take us both home?" he requested before his elf had a chance to ask him what he was doing in a London hallway without his jacket. Ooble nodded her head and took hold of his loose shirt tail.

Draco felt positively nauseous but was glad enough to be in his own home. Suddenly sitting all alone in his Coventry mansion pining away over his big hearted girlfriend while she tended to the needs of the less fortunate halfway around the world seemed like a just fine way to pass the time.

His big hearted girlfriend. His sweet, beautiful, brilliant, selfless, thoughtful girlfriend. The great love of his pitiful life.

Emily.

He almost choked when he thought of her. What would she think of what he had just done?

She wouldn't think anything, because she'd never know; that was the answer surely. He never had to tell her. Not ever. Not EVER.

He'd had one night of hedonism and fornication and he didn't need to share that with Emily or anyone else. He was Draco Malfoy for Merlin's sake! All through sixth year he had engaged in as much sex as he had wanted to with Pansy Parkinson anyplace he pleased; all over school, and he had never cared. No one had ever cared. Orinda Hartlestead had even given them carte blanche to shag in her classroom when class wasn't in session. Draco Malfoy could certainly have sex with impunity.

But he knew he was kidding himself with that thought. The Draco Malfoy who had existed in sixth year might have been able to do that. The old Draco could lie overtly or by omission to even a girl as sweet as Emily Flinders and not think twice about it. He could lie to anybody when it suited his means. But the Draco Malfoy who had survived a war, and the occupation of his parents' home, and losing one of his best friends and burying his godfather and learning to love two baby sisters was not so callous. This Draco; the one who had fallen head over heels for a girl without bothering to know her ancestry was a different person. The Draco Malfoy who was considering marrying outside his family's blessings without so much regard for giving up his birthright was not the same Draco Malfoy who could just lie like that.

Or could he? What good would it do anyone to tell? He could tell his father, who might be understanding, but may be disappointed. He couldn't tell his mother; no way… she would be devastated. And his father might tell his mother, so that was no good. And as much as he could have told Hartlestead of any indiscretion, this one involved his having wronged her very best friend and he somehow didn't think she'd be so understanding as she had been of his previous gaffs. It might even cost him that friendship. That was no good either. This was the first secret he'd ever kept from her intentionally, but he was pretty sure he had to keep it.

He moved across the polished wood floor in the sitting room where Ooble had left him. He didn't remember hearing her leave, but she was surely not there anymore. There was a bench along the side of the main stairs and he flopped himself onto it, wondering if he could send Ooble out for those snap-to cookies his father kept in the house. He felt ill and still a little drunk, but more than that he felt like a louse.

No ill deed he had ever performed in the service of the Dark Lord, and there had been many, had ever made him feel this bad about himself. He hadn't had to own anything he had done under orders- but for this he had no excuse. No excuse. There were excuses that could be made for any vandalism, torture, destruction or murder that he had done while wearing the mantle of a Death Eater. It wasn't his fault. He had to do it. He had no choice. But he knew that there was no convincing Emily, or himself for that matter, that there was any real reason for what he had done tonight. No- there was a reason; the reason was that he was selfish and stupid and had never the faculties to consider the long term ramifications of his idiocy.

Part of him wanted to owl Emily immediately and tell her everything; to spill his guts and assuage himself of some of the guilt he was feeling. But he knew that wasn't such a good idea. The last thing Emily needed while quartered in an orphanage in the back end of the third world was news that she had been betrayed by the man she loved. And she did love him. He knew that as fact and felt it so deeply from her that his conscience had panged him every time he had questioned his ability to live happily with someone who was less than pure blooded. Of course not one of those attacks of conscience had been anything close to this one.

This was the mother of all attacks of conscience. In fact, it disgusted him even more at himself that his conscience felt the need to kick in now- AFTER he had done something so egregious and not BEFORE it had gone that far. He figured he could chalk that up to his conscience not having gotten so much of a workout until very recently.

He couldn't lie to her. He couldn't. But he couldn't hurt her, either. He had no idea what to do. And he had no one he could talk to about it. This was the worst situation he had ever been in. Every time previous when he had done something deplorable or was in danger of any kind there had at least been people he could go to to talk about it. Not so now.

The one bit of sure decision making and the one modicum of wisdom he could find within himself was that there was no reason to make any decision tonight. His decision making skills were most certainly not in their best form at the moment. He could at least wait 'til morning to make any decisions.

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Have I been spoiling you with 2 chapters a day??? I think so. But now it's the weekend and I have to record a podcast and visit a shooting location for STAR TREK: PHOENIX and meet with a cinematographer and a storyboard artist and then I have a rehearsal for an audition. AND my husband will be at home and not at work, so he'll want some time and attention, too.

And so I leave you hanging on this Friday night. What will Draco do? Will he tell? Will he keep the secret? CAN he keep the secret? Find out on Monday when I'm back at the computer. Reviews could lead to a 3 chapter Monday. HINT HINT.

-MQ


	9. Chapter 9

DISCLAIMER in Chapter 1.

SORRY there was that insane amount of time between updates. Busy-ness and madness and work and everything else in the world all conspired against me. But here is a long chapter- sorry for the wait.

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Draco was just sure that he was going to be sick. Just when he thought that his life could not possibly get any more difficult: it had. It had in spades. It wasn't enough for him to have fallen madly in love with a girl whose ancestry was such that he might not be allowed, or even willing, to marry her. He had figured that problem out; there was no harm in living in sin and now that he had two little sisters the onus was no longer entirely on his shoulders to see after the continuation of the bloodline. And it wasn't enough that suddenly his inheritance was being split three ways. That, too he could handle; there was plenty to go around, wasn't there? And it wasn't even enough that his girl had gone off to the ends of the world and his friends all had jobs and spouses and lives that seemed to leave him out more often than not; it wasn't enough that he was lonely and miserable.

He had to get that damned owl.

Draco looked down at the rumpled parchment on the desk in his study, pouring over the words as though reading them over would make them disappear; would make them untrue. But no matter the magic in him, the words remained. Damn! This was the end of the world.

He had to do something. But there was nothing _to_ do. Things were as they were and there was very little that could be done about anything. Damn. He wanted to scream. He did scream. It didn't help. He needed to get his head together. He needed to know that this would work out; that things would be ok. He wanted to _hear _that things would be ok. He wanted his mommy.

But Narcissa Malfoy was not the person to turn to under these circumstances. No, this was not news he was ready to share with his mother. She would be sorely disappointed in him and on top of that she had enough to deal with taking care of a two month old and a fourteen month old. She didn't need the added stress of knowing that her twenty year-old was such a lout. He would talk to his father first. Lucius Malfoy was likely to be at least a little bit understanding of his predicament. But Lucius was not the one to go to for comfort.

Draco needed comfort. And he needed an ally.

He'd only ever had one of those; an ally. He'd had lackeys and minions and worshippers and casual acquaintances for all his life, but there had only been one person who had been his equal and his confidante and wise enough to get him out of a sticky situation. He had to go to Hogwarts to see Orinda.

He hadn't spoken to her much since the incident with Astoria the night of Zabini's party, and he still wasn't sure that she wouldn't be angry with him. In fact, he was almost certain she would be angry with him. But she was his friend; his real friend, and she would be there for him while he needed her. And he did need her. His breathing came to him more evenly as he made his way down his hallway to the parlor with the floo connection. Orinda might not be able to make anything any better, but she would be able to make him feel better.

She'd put her arms around him and pat his head and call him 'mo chroi' and tell him everything would be all right; just the same as she had the night his father had gone to prison. Orinda was good for making him feel better. Even if she was mad she'd be good to him; he was sure.

He stepped onto the polished stones of the parlor floo ad snatched up a pinch of powder from the pot on the mantle and tossed it onto the grate at his feet. "Hogwarts!" he called into the air as the floo powder created a flash. Draco found himself instantly in the reception room of his old school. He stepped from beneath the mantle and brushed the dust off of his jacket; he hated travelling by floo, but sometimes it was just necessary.

There was a statue that had stood sentry at the Hogwarts guest floo since the place was originally built and Draco had to wonder if the thing had gone mad in the time it had sat staring into a mostly disused fireplace. "Who goes there?" it bellowed as Draco took a step further into the room.

"I'm here to see Hartlestead," he answered the statue's bellowing. "Er… Professor Lynch," he corrected himself, remembering that Orinda went by her married name and only ever answered to her maiden name to humor him.

"She's home for the night," the statue answered him curtly, rolling its marble eyes at his somehow having missed that it was the middle of the night and that the flying teacher would be elsewhere at this hour.

"Great," Draco grumbled. How was he supposed to talk to her now? "And where is that?" he asked half out loud. It had never occurred to him before that he hadn't been to see her since she and Aiden had been married. She always came to wherever he was, or they'd meet somewhere in public. That had been mightily selfish of him, he figured. Much to his surprise, the statue answered him.

"The Quid Patch, Portree," it said. Draco nodded. Made sense; but was that a proper address? He had no real idea if it would work, but it was worth a try. He stepped back into the fireplace, snagging a handful of floo powder on his way and called out his destination as he tossed it onto the grate at his feet.

He had no idea if where he had gone was where he had intended to go, but he was certainly someplace else when he opened his eyes on the other end of his trip by floo. Draco shook the dust off himself as he stepped into what appeared to be the lobby of an apartment building which he could only guess was in Portree. There was a door directly in front of the fireplace and beside it a panel with a row of large red buttons down the right hand side.

He crossed to the panel and discovered immediately that he was probably in the right place. The names of the building's tenants were listed down the center of the panel and all of them were people Draco recognized. "Laughlin, Madley, Callaghan, Browning, McLaggan," Draco read aloud as he went down the list. Obviously the entire Pride of Portree lived in this building. "Eldridge, Murphy, Connor, Stimpson, Lynch." Draco nodded; he was definitely in the right place. Draco pressed the button beside the name 'Lynch' and in a moment the door to his left opened for him.

He stepped through the door in to a brief hallway which had but one door at the far end of it. That had to be Aiden and Orinda's flat. Draco took a deep breath; he knew that this wasn't going to be fun. He didn't want to give Orinda this news. He didn't even want to say it out loud, that was like making it true. But it already _was_ true and as much as he didn't want to face it, he had to, and if there was anyone he could trust to face it with him it was Orinda.

Draco stepped to the door and knocked. The door swung itself open and he heard Orinda's voice telling him to "Come in." Draco stepped far enough into the flat to let the door close behind him and wondered what exactly he was supposed to do next. "Mo chroi!" Orinda greeted him as she scurried into the room, wiping her hands on a little green and white towel. "I wasn't expecting you," she observed.

"Are you expecting someone?" he asked her tensely. He needed to talk to her but no so badly that he was willing to break down when there was a potential to be seen by strangers doing so.

"Oh no," Orinda answered him, gesturing to the sofa in the center of the room in a clear indication that he was welcome to sit. He wasn't sure he could do that. Draco took a few guarded steps further in to the room. He wrung his hands and realized suddenly that he was shaking. "What's the matter, mo chroi?" Orinda asked him quietly as she closed the distance between them. Draco shook his head and tried to look at her, but he couldn't. Might as well spit it out.

"Tori is pregnant," he managed to say. The words made him feel ill to hear out loud. Draco waited what seemed like a minute for Orinda to answer.

"Tori Greengrass?" she asked for clarification. Draco nodded. His eyes shifted to look at Orinda. Her arms were crossed and she was shaking her head and frowning. "Your ex-girlfriend?" she asked again. Draco kept nodding. "Am I to take it from your demeanor," she asked after another pause, "that this baby is yours?" Draco nodded more firmly as he felt tears burning the insides of his eyes.

And suddenly he felt the impact of Orinda's hand on his left cheek. She had slapped him! He hadn't been prepared for that. He had come here for comfort and had gotten hit in the face. Draco had no idea what to do next. He looked up at his friend and couldn't help but let the tears fall from his eyes onto his cheeks. "Rin?" he called her by the nickname her other close friends had always used.

"Don't talk to me," she insisted, turning her back to him and beginning to pace. Draco sniffled. This was awful. It had been awful enough already, but he only had one real friend in the world and now she had just slapped him and told him not to talk to her. One night's mistake was costing him everything.

Orinda was fuming. She paced back and forth between the end of the sofa and the far wall, where Aiden's World Cup broomsticks were hanging alongside both Lynches' Quidditch championship pennants. Draco couldn't handle standing there any longer, so he took her up on her earlier offer and quietly sat down on the sofa.

"What did Emily say when you told her?" Orinda finally stopped her pacing and asked him. Draco couldn't bring himself to answer. He just shook his head. "You haven't told her," Orinda surmised. Draco could tell that wasn't a question.

"No," he managed to whisper.

"You're telling me first," she offered, crossing her arms and frowning again, "because you want me to tell her." Draco nodded. She really did know him.

"Help me tell her," Draco corrected. "Just help me…." He added. He needed her support now as much as he ever had and he hated it that she was reacting this way. It wasn't so much that it surprised him, but he still hated it.

"Dammit Malfoy!" she yelled. She had never called him that before. "How dare you?" she asked rhetorically. "How dare you do this?" All Draco could do was shake his head and cry.

"I don't…" he sniffled. "I'm sorry," he managed to add.

"Sorry isn't gonna cut it," she said plainly.

"You have to help me talk to Emily," he managed to say, "I have to tell her I'm sorry," he added. "I know you know where she is and how to get there," Draco told her, finally able to look her in the face again. "You have to take me there so I can explain to her and you have to get her to forgive me."

"I don't _have to_ do anything but breathe 'til I die," Orinda answered him flatly. "And I'm certainly not obligated to do you any favors," she added. Orinda took a deep breath and sat on the sofa beside him. "You want me to be the one to tell my dearest friend that the only man she's ever been full on in love with has gone and betrayed her in the worst possible way then I will do that. I'm the one what's gonna have to pick up the pieces anyway." She shook her head and found Draco's eyes before she continued. "But you want me to take your side on this then you'll be sorely disappointed," she added. "I have always taken your side," she reminded him. "I took your side in every maddening school boy squabble you had with Harry stupid Potter," she said. "I took your side in trying to get that boy expelled in your sixth year when he put a hole in your chest even though I am sure to this day that you probably had it comin'. And I took your side when I watched you and Severus Snape kill a man… remember that?" she asked. Of course he did remember. That had been the worst night of his life and she had been there for him. "Do you?" she asked. Draco nodded. "Did I not give you my fastest broomstick and precise directions as to where you could go and be safe from whoever might wish to find you?" she asked. Draco nodded. That was exactly what she had done that night when her return from a night of drinking in Hogsmeade caused her to have to witness the death of Headmaster Dumbledore. "And when you did exactly what I had told you not to do under any circumstances and you came back from that safe place where I'd sent you did I not take you in and keep you safe at great risk to my personal safety?" she asked him, her voice getting more and more harsh as she went. Draco nodded again.

"You did," he agreed.

"You're damned right I did," Orinda affirmed. "And what did it get me in the long run?" she asked rhetorically. "You know," she shared, shaking her head again, "people warned me left and right not to get mixed up with you," she informed him. That stung a little, but Draco found it thoroughly believable nonetheless. "But I never saw that," she added. "We always had a great time," she said. Orinda took a deep breath before she continued. "I loved you," she told him, "and I let my best friend love you. And now," she began again, her voice growing shaky as she continued, "You've gone and hurt the sweetest, kindest, dearest most selfless person I've ever known in the absolute worst way possible. I'm not going to defend you for that."

"You hate me?" Draco asked. That sure seemed like what he was hearing. Orinda shook her head.

"No," she countered. She placed her hand on Draco's knee. "I don't hate you, mo chroi." Draco let out a breath he didn't know he was even holding. She was mad, but she didn't hate him, and she was calling him by her Irish nickname for him again. "I'm mad as hell at you," she confided. "And I will tell you right now that you'll be lucky if you ever hear from Emily again. But I don't hate you."

"Thank you," Draco sobbed, leaning forward and letting his head fall onto her shoulder. Orinda scooted closer to him and put her arms around his shoulders. Draco sighed a little; this is what he had come for.

"So how did your mother take the news?" she asked quietly as she patted his back. "She's got a three month old and a fourteen month old," she continued, "how does she feel about being a grandmother?" Draco swallowed hard.

His mother.

He was certainly not ready for that.

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No more long periods between updates... I promise. Please remember to review and that I love you all.


	10. Chapter 10

DISCLAIMER: in chapter one

Remember when I promised no more long times between updates...? Yeah so this is me saying "sorry". Life gets all crazy and other people make my schedule. But here is another chapter with the promise of more in less time than it took to get this chapter here after the last one. L/N fans should like this chapter :)

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Lucius Malfoy took the deepest breath he possibly could. The news he had to deliver wasn't likely to be taken well by his wife and the thought of upsetting her was enough to turn his stomach. But at the same time he couldn't keep the news from her and the longer he thought about it the sicker he felt.

Narcissa was standing with her back to the fireplace in the small library and Lucius hadn't expected to find her there. Isis was in a small cradle just a few feet away and Lucius crossed to check on his little daughter. "Hello love," he greeted his wife as he passed through the door and shut it behind himself. Once he could see into the cradle and was sure that Isis was sound asleep and content he patted her tiny blonde head and then turned back to Narcissa.

"Hello darling," she answered him, her face lighting up into a smile as she did. "I just got her down," she shared. Lucius shook his head; if they began exchanging pleasantries he'd never get this out.

"Narcissa, sit down," he insisted abruptly, his voice a little more gruff than he might have liked.

"Lucius, I'm fine," she answered, reaching out her hand for him to take. He had been wonderful to worry about her since Isis had come; but she was all but completely healthy now and there was no reason she couldn't stand by the fire if she didn't want to.

"I am sure you're correct," Lucius said back to her. "However, it is not the state of your health at this moment that I am so concerned about as the state of your nerves after I tell you what I'm about to tell you."

"Oh no," Narcissa answered back, taking a step away from the fireplace and allowing herself to sink into one of the cordovan leather chairs. "What is it, Lucius?" she asked. "Has something happened to Lilith?"

"No," he answered, "it's not Lilith."

"Draco then?" Narcissa presumed. Lucius wondered if, after all of these years, she had really learned to read the tone of his voice well enough to know when any bad news was about one of their children.

"I'm afraid so," Lucius admitted.

"What is it?" Narcissa asked him again. "What's happened?" Lucius took another deep breath. This was going to be interesting; and not in a good way.

"It seems Astoria Greengrass is expecting," Lucius said to her in the most delicate language he could come up with. Narcissa's mouth fell open for a moment. She then shook her head briefly and pursed her lips as she wrung her hands in her lap.

"And I am to take it from this news that Draco is somehow involved?" she asked her husband after a pause.

"I'm afraid so," he answered with a nod of his head. Narcissa frowned and stood abruptly.

"Well he is your son," Narcissa exhorted, crossing her arms over her chest and beginning to pace. "But I am hard pressed to think of Draco as being so immature and irresponsible."

"My son indeed," Lucius said back with a chuckle, leaning against the back of the chair that Narcissa had just vacated. "But I will remind you, Mrs. Malfoy, that you were quite interested in being equally irresponsible when we were his age."

"I will admit," Narcissa said back to him, "that I did have certain inclinations _after_ we were engaged. But you were just as interested- and if I recall the Slytherin gossip correctly you already knew what you were missing." Lucius chuckled.

"Correct again," Lucius said. "But I do seem to remember you as being quite enthusiastic about such things."

"You remember that?" Narcissa asked him, a flush coming to her cheeks with the memory. "Six days before our wedding…." She remembered, her voice trailing off as she spoke.

"And I seem to recall that I displayed remarkable self restraint," Lucius said back I his own defense. He remembered that day as vividly at this moment as if it had happened yesterday. He had snuck in to the master bedroom where Narcissa was staying as they prepared for their wedding very early in the morning. One thing had led to another and the two of them had come very close to making love right then and there.

"You displayed self restraint?" Narcissa answered back. "I had been restraining myself for nineteen years," she reminded him. "I was quite finished with that." Narcissa smiled wickedly at Lucius, who took a step toward her and grabbed her by the waist. He bent down and kissed her softly on her neck.

"How are you feeling?" he asked. He had delivered his bad news well enough and now the idea of an afternoon interlude with his wife (the first such possibility since Isis was born) was making the day much better.

"Not as well as what we're both suggesting," Narcissa answered him with a patient smile. She was all but completely recovered from Isis' birth, but not quite so well as to entertain the ideas that she had to guess were coursing through both of their heads. "Besides," she said back to him, crossing again to her chair and taking a hold of his hand as she went. "We have a problem to deal with," she finished as she took her seat.

"That we do," Lucius agreed.

"Do you agree that they are to be married at once?" Narcissa asked plainly, fiddling with her skirt. Lucius nodded.

"I believe that would be the appropriate course of action," he allowed. "But times are changed," he reminded his wife. "I am not sure that Draco will agree to such an arrangement."

"Poppycock," Narcissa answered back. Lucius was momentarily taken aback by his wife's expletive. "Draco knows better than to go against us," she asserted. "And no matter his behavior of late he is a gentleman. And I am quite certain that he will acquiesce to our insistence that any blood heir to our name or our fortune," she shuddered a bit and her voice dropped as she broached the topic of money, "should be born into this family legitimately."

"And as for Astoria Greengrass?" Lucius asked. His wife had a point when she said that Draco was a gentleman and had been raised to respect the family line. But the Greengrasses had never been in the Malfoys' social circle and Lucius had no idea as to whether or not they would force their daughter to honor certain proprieties.

"If I may be so indelicate," Narcissa replied, "that girl will likely jump at any chance to marry into this family." Narcissa looked very stern as she continued. "I would dare even consider that perhaps this addition to our family is due to a deliberate act on her part in order to garner just such a proposition. I can say that I am absolutely certain that she was equally complicit in this impending humiliation as our son is, and furthermore I believe firmly that she not only had every opportunity to say no to the behavior that led to this situation but also the information to prevent such conclusions if she truly cared to. There are no accidents, Lucius," She finished. Lucius couldn't help but chuckle at that as he turned his head to regard his sleeping daughter in her bassinette.

"Says a mother of three," he joshed, tugging at her hand. Narcissa sighed.

"Says a recently minted mother of three," she answered, "who spent more than a decade and a half actively maintaining her status as a mother of one." Lucius nodded. That was true. When Narcissa had been warned against becoming pregnant again after Draco's birth she had taken it upon herself to see to it that there was no possibility of that. It was only after Lucius had been sent to Azkaban that she had let her contraceptive potion run out and only after his return and a year of war and another of recovery that their two miraculous 'accidents' had come to them.

"It is true," he allowed, "that there are choices."

"Absolutely," Narcissa affirmed. "And the choice that miss Astoria Greengrass has made has a very specific consequence. And again I state that I would not be at all surprised to find that this entire fiasco was by design."

"And if it wasn't?" Lucius asked. "If she has no sense of duty or of honor and she really hasn't become pregnant for any reason other than stupidity and recklessness?"

"Then we remind her," Narcissa answered, turning in her chair to look at him more firmly, "and her parents," she added, "of exactly how much money she is walking away from." Lucius swallowed hard. He was not sure that he had ever heard his wife discussing finance so plainly. "And then we threaten to denounce the girl as a liar and her child as a bastard that is not of our line. They'll buckle."

Lucius shook his head. Was Narcissa really playing hardball? This was very new. He knew that his wife had become a strong and independent woman while he was locked away and that she had grown even more stalwart during the war and its immediate aftermath, but he had no idea that she had this kind if shrewdness and resolve within her makeup. But then, those Black genes tended to show themselves at the darndest times.

"And you know we can do it, too," Narcissa added, letting go of his hand and standing from her seat. She crossed to the far side of the room and poured herself a snifter of brandy from the decanter that the elves kept filled.

"Do what, love?" he asked, curious.

"It isn't an empty threat," she said back, "the Blacks have long held the secret to seeing to it that a child born out of wedlock had no claim to the family's assets."

"I had no idea," Lucius said to his wife, impressed, but somehow not surprised by that revelation. Narcissa smiled devilishly.

"Oh, it can be done," she assured him. "And I intend to make that point very cleat to Luther and Matilda Greengrass when they come for tea tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" Lucius asked. "So soon?"

"No time like the present," Narcissa replied, taking a sip of her drink. "The sooner the better, actually. The longer after the wedding that that child is born the better for all of us. Draco was two months early," she reminded him. "A baby at eight months will scarcely raise an eyebrow."

"You do have a point," Lucius answered her. "I trust that you will write the necessary letters?" he asked. Narcissa nodded.

"I will take care of it," she assured him. "But I do insist that you be in attendance," she added. Lucius smiled and answered.

"I wouldn't miss it."

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Reviews are better than illegal dark magic. And more powerful, too. :)


	11. Chapter 11

DISCLAIMER: in chapter 1.

Thanks for the patience and the reviews. And the reviews. And the reviews. More is coming... the story is about to get interesting.:)

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Draco examined himself in the mirror and tugged at his collar again. He had never been terribly fond of dress robes to begin with and for some reason this set was the most pernicious he had ever owned. The robes weren't even all that dressy, just new, and Draco couldn't help but think that the pale grey color washed him out. But he was sure that his head was more uncomfortable than his collar was.

He was about to get married in this suit and he wasn't the least bit happy about it. His parents and the Greengrasses had decided that he and Astoria were to be married immediately. That was a week ago and today was the day. His mother had been all over the place getting out 'impromptu' invitations, ordering a cake, planning a menu, and finding dresses for Tori and for herself all the while doing her level best to make sure everything looked as thrown-together-at-the-last-minute as anything Malfoy could possibly be.

He heard the door open behind him, was it time already? It couldn't be time already.

"How was Crete?" he heard a familiar voice call from the doorway. Draco felt himself relax a little as he turned to face Orinda, who hadn't bothered to knock. "And did you really elope?" she asked in follow-up. Draco shook his head and sighed, sinking into a nearby chair. He shook his head at her outfit. This wedding was an afternoon tea time affair and yet there she was dressed more like it was a morning funeral. But then again, she wasn't too far off.

"You look like an old schoolmarm," he commented with half a frown. He wasn't sure how she would take that, but lobbing an insult at her seemed like the proper thing to do in the moment. They hadn't spoken since the night he had told her that Tori was pregnant and he wasn't entirely sure who had invited her here today. But then again, she had always had a knack for showing up every time his life was in crisis; and today was the mother of all crises.

"If the tweed fits…" she answered him, smiling as she fingered the lapels on her high collar grey tweed robes.

"That's right," Draco joshed back at her, "you are an old schoolmarm now."

"I wouldn't say 'old' quite that way if I were you," she feigned a warning, "I'm only three years older than you are. But schoolmarm is about the long and the short of it." Draco chuckled. Having someone to poke fun at had lightened his mood a little. "Now," she began again, closing the door behind her, "tell me about Crete."

"We didn't even go," he admitted, rolling his eyes.

"Ach," Orinda said back, crossing to the chair adjacent to his and taking a seat. "I figured you'd at least have gotten a trip to Greece out of this deal?" Draco shook his head again. Not so.

That was the story that his and Tori's families had so carefully leaked into the world. He and Tori has ostensibly gone on an impromptu holiday in Greece a week ago, they had taken an afternoon sail and capriciously asked the boat's captain to marry them. They had then come home to astonished parents who insisted on throwing them a 'proper' wedding on a week's notice. The Malfoys were playing 'thrilled but inconvenienced' and the Greengrasses pretending to be 'proud and disappointed all at once'. It was all very well orchestrated, and as far as any of the conspirators could tell no one was the wiser to the actual reason for the rush nuptials.

"Never went to Greece," Draco admitted. "Never went anywhere. Never even got to go home," he added.

"You've been stuck in your parents' house for a week?" Orinda asked him. Draco nodded. It had been torture. He had been practically locked in his rooms for the past six days. Tori had been kept at the Manor, too; his best guess was that she had been put in the North Stateroom but he couldn't be sure. He only knew she had also been subject to similar confinement thanks to a comment made by Kibbitt, one of the kitchen elves. "If I'd have known that, I'd have come by sooner," Orinda told him.

"Thanks," Draco said back. "It's been miserable," he shared. "Mother will barely look at me," he added, "Father isn't able to string ten words together. I almost wish they'd yell at me," he continued, "at least then I'd know what they're thinking. But this silent treatment is driving me mad. I know I screwed up, but they won't even let me apologize to them."

"Give them some time," Orinda encouraged. "Things will calm down," she said, "Your parents love you. Maybe they're annoyed or disappointed or whatever, but give them the chance to let this whole thing sink in and everything will be all right." Draco looked at his friend and chuckled. She was a crummy liar.

"Thanks for trying," he allowed, "but I can see through your load of malarkey. My parents will never forgive me."

"Let them meet their grandchild and it will all get better," she said. Maybe she had a point.

"Once things are 'normal'," he suggested, "when their son is married with his own child." Draco sneered. Those words tasted foul in his mouth, he was pretty sure he wore that distaste all over his face.

"And the wedding all-quick-like," Orinda said to him, "that wasn't so much your idea, was it?"

"No," he answered. "In fact, I think the last thing my mother said to me was that this was going to happen and that I wasn't to leave the house until we left on our honeymoon. We're being sent to some castle in Lichtenstein where I don't want to go," he shared.

"You don't want to go to Liechtenstein?" Orinda asked him, "or you don't want to go on a honeymoon at all?"

"The second one," Draco admitted, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees.

"You want to get out of here?" Orinda asked plainly. Draco looked up and smiled sadly at her.

That had been Orinda's chief function in his life; she was his escape route. Every time since the day he had first spoken to her, whenever he had needed to get away from something or someone she had found a way to help him out. She had gotten him away from Pansy Parkinson whenever he had needed it, including the night of the Yule Ball in 4th year. When his father had been arrested and he wanted to come home and beat the magic out of the Aurors who were searching his family home, Orinda had kept him in her room and offered to take him anyplace in the world where there were no Aurors to give him grief. And when she had seen the death of Professor Dumbledore she had given him her fastest broomstick and sent him to the one place in the world she knew he would be magically untraceable. If he was to get out of this wedding she would be the one person who could help him.

"Where do you propose we go?" Draco asked, curious.

"You could always run away and join the circus," she answered him. Draco chuckled. Orinda's family had been circus people for something like twelve generations and her brothers were the current incarnation of the headlining "Famous McLeannes" on the detached trapeze. She really could arrange for him to run away and join the circus. "They're in Mozambique this month," she added. "No one would look for you there." Draco smiled and shook his head.

"How about Calcutta?" he asked. Orinda smiled sadly at him.

"She's not coming back," she told him. Draco swallowed hard and hung his head. He had his answer, then.

"Not ever?" he asked. He wasn't sure if that was better or worse. He knew that it might make his life worse if he ever had to run in to Emily out in the world now that she hated him and wouldn't speak to him, but he wondered if it was really any solace to know that he would never see her again.

"She's staying on at the orphanage," Orinda told him. "Dr. Bradenberg is back already," she added. "But Emily's not coming back. I saw her a week ago; went to Calcutta while Aiden was playing in Canada. There wasn't any Quidditch at Hogwarts for the weekend so I had some time. She loves her work there."

"Does she love me?" Draco asked. He looked up at her and she could see his eyes beginning to fill.

"Ach, mo chroi," Orinda said back, reaching her hands out to take one of his. "I don't know," she answered him honestly after a moment.

"That's fair," he said back.

"I know she did love you," Orinda told him by way of consolation. "And I know her better than anyone. And I don't think that she's the kind of person who would let a mistake, even a mistake as big and as empty headed as the one you made, to shut down her heart. But that heart's a bit broken at this moment," she added. "So I don't know what to tell you."

"Mozambique?" Draco asked. Africa didn't sound so bad.

"Or we could go to New Orleans," she answered him. "Or I hear that the Aleutians are nice this time of year, or you could just come and hide out in my flat in Portree." Draco shrugged his shoulders.

Could he even do that? Could he run away from his parents, his home, his two little sisters, his inheritance, his entire life, just to get out of marrying someone he didn't want to marry? Not to mention his very own child…? He thought about it for a moment. He didn't love Tori, but he didn't hate her, he didn't want to see her humiliated by being pregnant and jilted at the altar. He might have once been willing to give up everything he ever had for love, for Emily, but was he willing to give all of that up just to be free of taking responsibility for his own actions? And what about this baby that was coming? He couldn't keep his mind from going back to that. He didn't want to punish an unborn child for his own idiocy. He thought in one breath that he had to go through with this and in the next that he had to get out of there.

He couldn't be sure. And if he wasn't sure then he couldn't go anywhere. If he could not be one hundred per cent certain that he would never regret taking off at this moment, then he had to stay here and go through with it.

"I don't think I can," Draco said to his friend, standing up and running his hands through his hair.

"I knew you were going to say that," Orinda admitted. She stood up and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Yeah?" Draco asked, turning to face her. "I wasn't so sure."

"You're not the same selfish prat I met back at Hogwarts," she told him, stepping forward to put her hands on his shoulders. "War and deprivation and pain and age and maturity can do that to a person," she added. "You're stepping up and being a grownup. I respect you for that."

"You've never said that before," he answered her.

"You've never acted like an adult before," she answered. "You screwed up," she reminded him, "but you're taking your medicine and you're not trying to punish anyone else in the process. That whiny little boy who wanted nothing more than to make Harry Potter's life miserable has grown in to a responsible and decent man. Who knew?" she joked. Draco laughed.

"I'm glad you came," he told her. And he was. He really hadn't been sure that he would ever see her again after he had broken her best friend's heart and ruined his own future the way he did.

"Of course I came," Orinda assured him. "There was no way I was going to miss your wedding. After all, you're the main reason I didn't miss mine." Draco laughed. That was the truth. Orinda had locked herself in the bathroom and refused to come out on the morning of her wedding when her brothers had poked fun at her dress. No amount of coaxing from Emily would get her to come out and she had enlisted Draco as an 'uninterested' male opinion. The dress had been exquisite, but he could see why the very boyish Orinda's five brothers had teased her about looking so much like a girl. Draco had been the one to convince her not to put on trousers before walking down the aisle. It had turned out that Aiden lost a bet over that, but everyone had been pleased with the dress.

"There is that," Draco agreed, still chuckling at the memory of pushing and coaxing her out into the church vestibule.

"You dragged me to my wedding," she reminded him, "so I came to drag you to yours if need be."

"That won't be necessary," Draco told her.

"Good," she answered. "You don't want it to get out that you had to be forced down the aisle by an old schoolmarm." Draco laughed again. His mood was getting lighter.

"It won't be so bad," he allowed. "The wedding is nothing, an hour of my time…."

"And Tori adores you," Orinda reminded him. "She'll try to make you happy."

"And if she doesn't," he proposed, "there's always the circus." Orinda chuckled and patted his arm.

"That there is, mo chroi," she agreed. "Now, let's go get you married."

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Please review... please. Love to all my readers.

-MQ


	12. Chapter 12

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER 1

So to all of you who have been poking me to update: I love you. I DO know where this story is going and I SWEAR I will not abandon it. I have just been super busy with RL/work. Being a working actress is a great thing, but leaves less time for other creative pursuits. That said; here I am true to form and updating because reviews make me happy. I may even work on the next chapter today.... :) -MQ

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Wearing only her slip, Narcissa sat before her vanity mirror brushing the curls out of her hair. It had grown far too hot upstairs and she hadn't yet cooled herself enough to have bothered with a dressing gown and her feet were so happy to be out of her shoes and into the fur of the rug beneath her that the idea of donning her slippers wasn't one she was ready to entertain. She couldn't help but hate her reflection at that moment; unable as she was to shake a sour expression from her face no matter her efforts. Her son was wed, her guests were tended to, and her baby daughters were asleep in their cradles. All should have been well by her estimation, and yet in the back of her head there continued to be a trepidation that she just could not escape.

She shifted the focus of her gaze from her own reflection to that of her husband as he sat on their bed behind her. He had pulled his hair loose, removed his waistcoat, and untied his cravat. Now in his shirtsleeves he was undoing the laces on his shoes. Narcissa thought again about her own wedding day, just as she had so many times throughout this process of arranging her son's marriage, and she had to admit that the unsettled feeling she'd carried with her all day got worse when she did. Lucius caught her eyes in the mirror and smiled at her.

"Are you all right, dearest?" he asked her. Narcissa shrugged her shoulders.

"I'm honestly not sure," she answered, beginning again with her hair brush. "Do you think we've done the right thing?" she asked, not meeting his eyes as she did. Lucius rose from his seat and crossed to stand behind her. Narcissa couldn't help but smile at that; the first smile of the day that hadn't been forced. She found it peculiar yet comforting that she still took joy from these intimate moments with Lucius. Seeing him in his stocking feet with his shirt tail askew was not a privilege ever afforded to anyone else.

"Don't you think so?" he asked her, placing his hands on her shoulders. Narcissa shrugged her shoulders slightly and allowed herself a soft sigh.

"I really don't know what to think," she answered him quietly. Lucius bent down and kissed her lightly at the spot where her neck met her right shoulder.

"Would you have had it differently?" he asked her, pressing his cheek to her temple and finding her eyes in her reflection again.

"You mean, other than the obvious?" she asked in reply. Of course she would have had it differently. Had she been given any say in the matter she'd have had it that Draco and Astoria had never been so irresponsible as to have caused this whole scenario to begin with.

"Yes," Lucius said back to her.

"I've been wondering about that," she admitted. "What if this had happened between Draco and Emily?" she asked rhetorically. "What if this scenario had come about between our son and the love of his life? Knowing what we do and do not about her lineage, would we have pushed so hard for them to marry?"

"You've been talking to your sister," Lucius surmised.

"I have," Narcissa admitted, "but that's not what's causing this." Lucius seated himself on the bench behind her, keeping her gaze in the mirror as he did.

"Well to answer your question," Lucius said to her, "This would never have happened between our son and the very sensible love of his life. Emily is neither bubble headed nor is she conniving and you yourself have said that it is one of those qualities that led us to where we are today; an assertion I happen to be in agreement with. Emily is too clever to have let something like this happen accidentally and too sweet to have done something like this intentionally." Narcissa sighed. Her husband was right. "And there is no use in wondering," Lucius added. "The situation is what it is, dearest. And like it or not we've a daughter-in-law and sooner than we'd likely prefer we will have a grandchild."

"A grandchild…" Narcissa let herself think about that for a moment. The idea that her eldest grandchild would be less than a year younger than her youngest daughter struck her as just plain bizarre. She shook her head and set her hairbrush back on her dressing table. Folding her hands in her lap, she shook her head. Lucius snaked his arms around her waist and leaned his forehead against her temple.

"Your melancholy pains me, my love," he whispered to her. "What can I do to quiet your mind?"

"If only I knew," Narcissa said back. She caught his gaze in the mirror again. "I look at you, Lucius," she began, "and I think about this quarter century I've been in love with you. And it breaks my heart to think of Draco spending the next quarter century without that feeling."

"I am sorry you are so troubled," Lucius said to her, kissing her neck and standing to face her. "But perhaps it will never come to that."

"What are you talking about, Lucius?" she asked, looking up at him.

"Isn't it obvious?" he asked by way of reply. "We bide our time for now," he added, "let the baby come, see how things turn out. If Draco is unhappy a year from now then there is certainly a course of action."

"You're not suggesting divorce?" Narcissa asked. She was more than a little surprised that her husband would even allude to such a possibility.

"That is the common remedy for a loveless marriage," he replied.

"I must admit that I am quite shocked that you would consider that a viable…course of action," she said echoing his own words.

"Really?" he asked, wondering silently how come the idea hadn't been as obvious to her as it was to him.

"Really, Lucius," she said back. "Think about it," she implored him, "our marriage was terrible," she reminded him, "from 1983 until 1991, but I don't believe that either one of us ever entertained the idea of a divorce."

"No," Lucius agreed, "we didn't. But…" he continued, sinking down onto his knees and taking both of her hands in his. "I was in love with you that whole time," he said. "And I presume that you were just as in love with me," he added. Narcissa smiled at her husband and nodded.

"That I was," she answered. "Always," she added. Lucius kissed her hand before standing up again.

"And therein the difference lies," he stated plainly. Narcissa shrugged her shoulders. He did have a point. A miserable marriage between two people who were madly in love with each other and somehow had lost the ability to communicate that was not the same as a marriage between two people who didn't love each other at all. But then again; it was only Draco who wasn't in love. From what Narcissa had been able to glean from her few moments alone with Astoria, the girl was quite taken with her son. Maybe it wouldn't come to that. But something inside of her felt a little better knowing that it was within the realm of possibility.

"Has any Malfoy ever divorced?" Narcissa asked. She wondered in that moment just what kind of a scandal she might be in store for were her son to choose to leave his wife and new baby in a year. Lucius nodded.

"Commodus the fourth divorced his second wife," he answered. Narcissa felt herself beginning to frown as her mind found the proper reference within. There had been seven Commodus Malfoys all told and the sordid history of the Malfoy family would have been difficult enough to recall had so many of the gentlemen's names not been the same.

"I thought," she said, remembering something about Lucius' correct ancestor, "that she was killed mysteriously." Lucius shook his head and chuckled.

"That she was," he answered. "But that was after he divorced her. After the suspicious death of his first wife; his second wife, who was much younger than he, had a hex put on herself wherein she couldn't die as long as they remained married. So when he decided it was the end for the two of them he divorced her. It was only after that that she was found dead in her bath."

"Oh," Narcissa squeaked. As long and as wicked as the history of the Black family was, she wasn't sure she would ever get used to the madness in the past of the family she had married into.

"So don't worry about Draco, love," Lucius reassured her. "He wouldn't even be the first. Let's just be happy that we've avoided scandal thus far and that we have three healthy children and a grandchild on the way, and that our own marriage is as happy as it possibly could be." Narcissa smiled up at her husband. He had always known just what to say to pick up her spirits.

"Will you still find me desirable when there's someone calling me 'grandmother'?" she asked. Lucius grinned and chuckled, stepping away from her vanity table and back toward the center of the room before giving her his answer:

"Come over here and let me show you."


	13. Chapter 13

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER ONE

See what happens when I get a bundle of reviews in a short period? Here is ANOTHER chapter. Maybe even more later today- but no promises without more reviews. Yes, I am shameless. Love to readers and reviewers! -MQ

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Draco had decided within the first ten minutes of his damnable honeymoon that he hated Lichtenstein. He had never been a fan of Germanic architecture and the kitschy décor did not help. The castle that his parents had sent him to was just the right combination of ridiculous and spooky to make him feel wholly unsettled.

Of course, he was pretty sure that he would have been just as unsettled anywhere in the world under the circumstances. He still couldn't believe that he had actually gotten married. He hated that fact more than he hated the castle.

And Tori wasn't helping. She was draped over the stupidly large bed in their suite still in her wedding dress; a diaphanous white shift that Draco thought looked ridiculous. Who was she trying to fool? Of course, it seemed as though a lot of people had been fooled by the elaborate production of a wedding that his parents and the Greengrasses had managed to pull off this afternoon. Tori had danced with him at the reception, playing the part of the blushing bride, overwhelmed with happiness. But she hadn't let up even for a second since they had left their reception hours ago. She had basically refused to shut up for even a second; she rattled on and on about the wedding and the music and the guests and the gifts, and whatever else she could think to rattle on about. Only her constant guzzling of champagne interrupted her unending chatter.

"And did you hear Millie when she told me that she wants to do a sitting with me in my wedding dress for _Witch Weekly_? _Witch Weekly_ , Draco! It's so exciting! And she says that she wants to have shots of me in the dress I had on when we eloped in Crete, so I suppose that I'll have to look through my things and decide what I might have worn had that actually happened, but I think it's just wonderful, I mean; I've never been in a magazine. Won't Daffy and Ashleigh and Liese and pansy just go bonkers with it…."

Would she ever cease?

Draco could not imagine the rest of his life with that noise in the background. He wondered if he would ever gain skill at tuning her out. He doubted that: she was damned noisy.

"Draco?" Draco shook his head… had she just asked him a question?

"What?" he snapped. He couldn't be bothered to give her a more dignified reply. Tori giggled and slithered across the bed to sit on the edge nearest to the chair where he had installed himself upon their arrival.

"I asked if you'd like another drink," she repeated herself, waggling her latest champagne bottle at him. He looked at his nearly empty glass on the table beside him and considered for a moment whether getting himself blitzed out of his mind would make the night any more bearable or serve only to incite a headache the likes of which would serve to make Tori's incessant babbling that much more unbearable in the morning. He didn't remember her always being this annoying. Maybe it was an affect of the champagne. Worth a try….

"No," he said back to her. "How much of that stuff have you had, anyway?" he asked. "And aren't you supposed to lay off it?"

"Why?" she asked, frowning in is direction. Draco shook his head. Had she forgotten…? He remembered his mother steering clear of anything alcoholic while she was expecting his sisters and he had come to believe from Emily and Dr. Bradenberg that that was basically standard procedure.

"Because you're pregnant, Tori," he reminded her sternly. "Remember?" he spat, "the reason for this whole thing?" He shook his head and ran his hand through his hair. He hadn't wanted to be mean to her, but she was acting like an idiot. Tori sat up straight and frowned in his direction. She shook her head and refilled her glass again, setting the bottle on the carved wooden nightstand.

"We need to talk, Draco," she said softly. Draco rolled his eyes: all she had been doing all night was talking. What in the name of Merlin's whiskers could she possibly have to say at this point? "I hadn't been able to see you," she continued, "our parents kept us locked away from each other this week and I needed to see you for days now," she continued. Draco picked up his glass and drained the dregs from the bottom of the vessel before reaching for the bottle that Tori had left on the nightstand. He filled his glass again and kept the bottle in his hand resting on his knee; he would need some alcoholic fortification should she be about to launch in to an epic monolog on how she had been pining away for him or some like.

"And what, pray tell Tori, do we so need to talk about?" he asked. He could tell that she wasn't fond of the tone of his voice, but he was no fan of the sound of her voice at the moment either.

"Draco…" she began, suddenly sounding very serious. He sat up in his chair to look her in the eye. Perhaps she was going to apologize for getting him in to this. She knew full and well that he wasn't in love with her, and he knew full and well that she was in love with him. He wondered in that moment if she was having guilt over getting him into this cursed wand-end marriage. And he wondered if he could ever forgive her.

"What is it, Astoria?" he asked even more sternly, not surprised to hear shades of his father in his voice.

"Draco," he began again, her lip trembling as she forced herself to look him in the eye. "I'm not pregnant," she said softly.

WHAT?!?!?

"Excuse me?" he managed to ask, standing from his chair and trying very hard to breathe.

"I don't know if I was and now I'm not or if it was a false alarm to begin with, but as of a few days ago I am quite sure that I'm not…."

"I can't believe you," he stammered. His head was swimming. Had she really just told him that he had doubly made the biggest mistake of his life? Had she just told him that this madness of a forced and hasty marriage had been predicated on a lie, or on a mistake?

"It's true," she answered, standing up and bracing herself against the nearest bedpost.

"Shut up!" he said to her, unable to take another moment of the sound of her voice.

"Draco…" she tried to address him.

"SHUT UP!" he yelled at her as loudly as he could, flinging the half full bottle of champagne at her. Tori managed to dodge the flying glass bottle, which found purchase on the bed post and shattered in to dozens of pieces, showering Astoria in shards of glass and splashes of liquid. He couldn't think of another word to say to her. He couldn't stand the thought of being in that room for another minute. He couldn't stand the thought of her, much less the sight of her.

He was going to be sick, he was sure of it.

He had to get out of there.

Without another word, Draco turned on his heel and stalked out the door. This would have to be dealt with; he just had to figure out how.


	14. Chapter 14

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER ONE

Reviews make me update :)

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It had taken Draco more than an hour of running around and pacing and cursing under his breath and at the top of his lungs to so much as get his thoughts together enough to even begin to have a clue as to what to do next.

But suddenly it hit him; like the tower of the castle above him crashing to the ground it hit him. He had just gotten what he wanted. There was no baby. There was no reason to be married to Tori. It was as if the Universe had just opened up and given him the chance he had wanted all along.

The chance to make it all up to Emily.

Draco turned back toward the castle and broke into a flat run. He had to get to a Floo connection. He had to get to Emily.

This was his chance and he realized in a moment of clarity that he had to take it or live with regrets for the rest of his life. He would go to Calcutta; he would fall at her feet and beg her forgiveness; and he wouldn't take no for an answer. He would stay there in that cursed orphanage making penance for all of the wrong that he had done to Emily and he wouldn't leave until they were wed.

Of course there would be the matter of Astoria to contend with. But that could be handled. How many Malfoy brides had died mysteriously over the centuries when their husbands had become displeased with them? He could even get rid of her himself; he had done murder before. As pleasant as the thought of Tori's timely demise might be to him in that moment of still stinging anger, Draco knew that he wouldn't truly be able to dispatch with her. He had sworn to leave the murdering behind him once Lord Voldemort was out of his life forever and he didn't think that even this warranted going back on that. But he would be rid of Astoria one way or the other. After all, the marriage vows hadn't even been sealed yet; the marriage would have to be consummated before that happened and he was dead certain that was never going to happen. And it wasn't like marriage vows were unbreakable vows, particularly the ones he and Tori had spoken this afternoon. They had said 'through my life' which was less permanent than the usual 'as long as I am alive' and certainly less involved than the 'forever' that his parents had spoken at their wedding.

All in all he felt as though this sham of a marriage he had been stuck in for the past several hours was as temporary as the champagne buzz that was already clearing from his head. He was single minded in his purpose to set things right once and for all.

He was panting by the time he reached the entrance to the castle. The heavy wooden door was closed and locked and Draco realized that he was screaming at whomever might be inside to let him the hell inside. He didn't even care in that moment if it was Astoria herself who let him inside. He was a man on a mission. After what felt like an hour of banging at the splintering wood of the front door it finally swung open. Draco practically fell through the doorway and into the vestibule, catching himself before his knees hit the rug. Thankfully there was no one else in the room to witness his stumbling.

Draco looked around; there were three fireplaces within his line of sight and he hadn't the mental acuity to remember if anyone had ever told him which if any of the grates was connected to the Floo network. But then he spotted what had to be a pot of Floo powder on the hearth of one and was sure that had to be the place. He dashed as fast as the slippery floor stones would allow him to the fireplace and snatched up a handful of Floo powder far more carelessly than he ever had in his life.

But then it occurred to him in the moment when he stepped through the mantle; he had no idea where the hell he was going. He knew better than to guess at a destination when travelling by Floo powder. He had heard stories since childhood of wizards who had mis spoken by only a syllable or even a single vowel sound and were never seen or heard from again. He wagered that 'Calcutta' wouldn't be enough to get him anywhere useful. And there was every chance that there was more than one orphanage in that third world cesspit so 'Calcutta Orphanage' would likely not work either.

But it might be worth the risk. He would risk anything to get to Emily, but what good would anything be if she never knew he was trying…? He had to get to her but he didn't know where in the world she was- not in any meaningful way.

And then he realized that he knew someone who did. He heard himself laugh out loud at his own stupidity and he silently cursed himself for taking a whole minute to figure this out. Draco hurled the Floo powder at his feet and called out his destination. "The Quid Patch, Portree!"

Orinda would know how to get to Emily. Just this morning she had told him that she'd been there recently. She would know where to go and how to get there and Draco was sure as he stepped from the Floo in Orinda's building that she would help him. She had offered to take him away this afternoon and he was pretty sure that she wouldn't even need much convincing to take him where he wanted to go tonight; not under the circumstances, not once she heard what was really going on.

Draco dashed across the little lobby to the panel with the tenants' names listed on it and punched the button that would bring him to the Lynches' flat. When the door beside the panel swung open to allow him passage he ran full tilt the few feet down the hall to the Orinda's front door. He pounded on the door with the same fervor that he had the much heavier door to the castle in Lichtenstein and he found presently that it didn't take the treatment nearly as well. The latch gave after only a few blows and he was able to pull the door open and let himself inside.

"What the hell is all the sodding racket?!" Draco heard Aiden holler as the both of them dashed in to the main room of the flat. Of course this would be the night that Aiden was home. Nothing could be altogether easy. "Malfoy?" Aiden started when he recognized the intruder. "The hell? I thought you were supposed to be on your honeymoon?"

"I have to talk to Hartlestead," a still out of breath Draco answered him, not bothering to wonder how Aiden might feel about hearing his wife referred to by her maiden name.

"Wedding night jitters?" Aiden tried to joke, feigning a punch in Draco's arm. Draco looked back at his friend with an expression that he was sure told Aiden that this was no time for jokes. "Woah!" Aiden replied, taking half a step back and holding his hands up in a gesture of surrender. "Sorry man," he said. "You look like hell," Aiden commented. "Have a seat?" he asked, "drink?" Draco shook his head. As nice as it might be at this moment to have another guy to commiserate with over what an unbelievably horrid day this had been he still had a singular purpose in his mind and he couldn't pause even for a moment.

"No," Draco answered plainly.

"Anything I can do?" Aiden asked. He really was a good guy; and truth be told he would probably help if he could. He might even know where Draco wanted to go. But not knowing how much Aiden did and did not know meant that he might have to spend precious time explaining himself and he felt like every moment that passed was killing him a little.

"I just need to see your wife," Draco said to him, the adrenaline in his system causing his voice to shake.

"She's at Hogwarts, mate," Aiden answered him. "Some sort of an emergency." Draco nodded. Damn. That could be inconvenient. If he was going to have to tear Orinda away from an emergency at the school then there might be an undue delay in his getting to Calcutta. What time was it in India anyway?

He couldn't stop to think about what might happen when he got to Hogwarts; he just had to get there. Depending on what it was that had called Orinda away he was fairly confident in his ability to convince her that his own personal emergency was far greater than anything that could possibly be going on at the school. Unless the Basilisk had risen from the dead or the ghost of Lord Voldemort had once again possessed a member of the staff then there could not possibly be anything more pressing in Orinda's life at the moment than what was happening to him.

"I've got my own emergency," Draco shared with Aiden.

"Everything all right?" Lynch asked his guest. Draco shook his head and shrugged. No: everything was not all right, but there was the first potential in weeks for things to be all right and he would be damned if he didn't do everything he could to make things all right. Aiden shook his head and took a step to the side, gesturing to his mantelpiece and a little clay jar of Floo powder that set atop of it.

"I hope it works out for you, mate," Aiden said, seating himself on the arm of his couch.

"Thanks," Draco answered, taking a measured step toward the fireplace. His lifelong distaste for travelling by Floo had somehow expired tonight and he actually felt happy to be stepping into the Lynches' relatively clean fireplace and he could feel himself even beginning to relax a little as he tossed the small handful of Floo powder into the flicker at his feet and said, "Hogwarts."

He'd be with Emily any minute now.

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So I know I have left Draco in the middle of a crisis and in the middle of an action sequence. Truly had I kept going it would have been an incredibly long chapter and another several hours until an update. Oh yeah- and more chapters means more chances for reviews. Love to everyone who has reviewed so far and I swear that every review that came in made my fingers work faster. :)

-MQ


	15. Chapter 15

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER ONE

another little installment:

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When the Floo network deposited Draco at Hogwarts he didn't even wait to be addressed by the sentry statue. "Where is Professor Lynch?" he demanded of the concrete artifice.

"On the Quidditch Pitch," the statue snipped back. Draco nodded. It was a far hike to get to, but at least she wasn't someplace that would require him to learn a password or conjure up a secret door. He took off at a flat run toward the nearest door that would lead him outside.

He ran as fast as he could, faster than he had ever really run for any length of time in his own memory. His feet took him down several hallways, through a breezeway, then a courtyard, across the footbridge, down the hill and toward the Quidditch Pitch. From several yards away he could hear the bellowing of Orinda's voice even over the rattle of his own breathing. She sounded angry.

Draco dashed through the players' entrance, past the locker rooms, and onto the field. He was lucky that he remembered from his days as a player to look up immediately upon stepping onto the grass or he might have lost his head courtesy of a row of speeding students on broomsticks flying low to the ground in a corkscrew pattern.

"Watch where you're going!" Orinda's voice boomed. Draco was just able to catch sight of her on her broomstick, hovering in the middle of the pitch with her wand to her throat and a very stern look on her face; a look that departed the moment that she spotted Draco. "Laps around the outside!" she ordered, "until I say you can stop. And the first one of you that falls behind the others is polishing the hoops." Orinda shook her head and descended through the throng of students racing to be at the head of the pack. She stopped just in front of him and crossed her arms over her chest.

"What's going on here?" Draco couldn't help but ask. Never in his years of schooling had he ever heard of Quidditch practice going so long into the night and he was pretty sure that more than one house team was out there running drills. What kind of emergency was this, anyway?

"Someone sent an exploding howler to the Gryffindor seeker and this lot will be flying drills until someone fesses up." She rolled her eyes. "Now what's going on with you?" she asked almost forcefully. "This is supposed to be your wedding night and yet here you stand, in the middle of the school's pitch at an ungodly hour looking like you've been run over by the knight bus… twice." Draco frowned at that. He hadn't thought about what he must look like; in the shirt and trousers he had worn to his wedding, covered in champagne spray and sweat and tears and Floo powder.

"I need you," he said. Orinda shook her head and grinned at him.

"That, mo chroi, is clear," she answered. Draco wanted to smack her off her broomstick. How dare she be smug and friendly when his life was in such turmoil? But then he remembered that she didn't know yet.

"Tori isn't pregnant," he blurted out.

"She's what?" Orinda asked, dropping to her feet and leaning against her upright broomstick.

"She's not pregnant," Draco repeated. "She told me tonight."

"Well I'll be damned," Orinda sighed. Draco nodded. It felt good to tell someone.

"I don't know if she lied to me from the get go or if she really thought she was pregnant or… I don't know what is going on…." Draco could feel tears beginning to well up in his eyes. He looked her in the eye and put his hands on her shoulders. "It was all a mistake," he sobbed. "All of it was a mistake."

"Oh Draco," Orinda sighed, pulling him in to an embrace as his sobs overtook him. "What can I do?"

That was easy. She was already offering to do whatever he needed.

"Take me to Calcutta," he implored. Orinda pulled away from him to look him in the face again. She was smiling gently; the same smile he remembered from the night his father had been arrested. But her face changed when she caught his gaze.

"You're serious?" she realized. Draco nodded.

"I have to tell Emily I'm sorry. I have to see her," he added, "I have to beg her forgiveness. Please, Orinda, _please…._" He could feel his knees about to buckle and he had to lean against her to keep his balance. "Please," he asked again through fresh tears. Orinda shook her head; she could tell that there would be no peace tonight unless she gave Draco what he wanted.

"All right," she agreed, her voice soft with resignation.

"Really?" he asked, barely believing how easy it had been to convince her.

"Really," she affirmed. "I know better than to fight you when you've really got your heart set on something. And I can tell that you're not going to give up until I do as you ask. Now, I can't guarantee you that she'll even see you when we get there," Orinda qualified. "And if she does I can't guarantee that you're gonna like what she has to say. But I'll take you." Draco grabbed her and hugged her as he shook with the sobs that he knew he had to quell before trying to talk to Emily. Orinda put her wand to her throat again and made an announcement to the Quidditch players who were still flying speeding circles around the perimeter of the viewing stands. "All right you lot," she called to them, "that's it for the night. Get your sorry arses in bed because if I've not got a confession in writing before the sun comes up we'll all be back here again before breakfast. And if you think I'm a pain right now, keep in mind that my own husband cannot stand me in the morning."

"You're really not so bad in the morning," Draco sad to her, recalling more than one occasion when they had spent a night in the same room. He didn't remember her having been any more difficult than usual.

"But they don't know that, do they?" she teased back. "If I want them to be even more afraid of me than they are right now then the best thing to do is to make them think that this is only the beginning of the hell I intend to rain down upon them if I don't get the answer I'm looking for."

"You are a Slytherin to your core," Draco commented. Orinda smiled at him.

"Which makes you a lucky git," she joked. She looked up to see the ragged Quidditch players flying slowly back toward the castle. And ragged they were. Draco had to wonder just how long they had been at this, and just what bizarre circus-based tricks and drills she had come up with as punishment. "Now come on," she said to him as soon as the last of her victims had cleared the pitch grounds. "Let's get you a little cleaned up and then we'll go."

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And they're off. All of you that have been waiting to hear how sweet, adorable, never-sid-a-harsh-word-to-anyone little Emily will approach Draco given the chance will get their wish in the next chapter. Will he get the silent treatment, will she hex him blue in the face or elsewhere, or will ove conquer all and all be forgiven?

Stay tuned....

Can you tell I work in television?

Reviews make me happier than money makes a Weasley. :p


	16. Chapter 16

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER ONE

You asked for it and here it is :) The super duper double-length confrontation scene...

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It turned out that the password to the Slytherin dungeons was never kept a secret from a Slytherin alumnus. This fact proved to be to great advantage to Draco, as Orinda had been able to take him down to her old room and tidy him up. He managed to get his face and hands washed and enough of the dirt and Floo powder charmed off of his clothing that he felt almost presentable. Part of him was about ready to wing by his manor in Coventry to change his suit and grab a jacket, but Orinda had cautioned away from that. If he looked too polished, the true immediacy of his situation might be masked and that could be the difference between Emily listening to him and her sending him away.

Once his appearance was well enough by her estimation, Orinda took him by his wrist and led him back up through the castle and into the room with the connected fireplace. He had kind of hoped that Calcutta was within apparating distance, or at least that she would have a portkey. But what was the harm in a little more dirt? Orinda squeezed his wrist as she scooped up a dollop of the Floo powder and tossed it in to the grate at their feet and called out "Calcutta Central."

Calcutta central? Was that really it? Draco was rolling his eyes through the moment it took the Floo network to deposit the two of them in the correct fireplace. If he had known it was that simple, and that pronounceable, and that easily guessed, he'd have saved himself half an hour and come here directly.

But then he figured it was better this way. This way he hadn't had to guess and risk winding up on the far end of the globe with no reliable way to get home, or worse, nowhere at all and lost for eternity in the maelstrom of lost signals. And this way he had a hand to hold, too. This way he had someone along with him who gave damn that his heart was breaking and that his life was in crisis and would still love him at the end of the night no matter what else happened. That was definitely a good thing.

The Floo had brought them to a giant clay artifice in the middle of an open plaza. This certainly didn't look like any orphanage Draco had ever envisioned. It was bigger, for one; much bigger. He was even more glad than ever that he had Orinda along with him. She would likely know how the hell to find Emily in this mess.

It was obvious to Orinda that Draco was more than a little miffed at where they had ended up. "It's the central square," she explained to him as she stepped out from under the clay mantle and onto the dirt of the street before them. "The orphanage doesn't have a proper Floo," she added. "There's no place in this district that does other than the square." Draco frowned.

He hated poverty and he hated the unwashed masses and he really really hated the third world and yet here he was. He was already having a foul time and he had only been in this place for thirty seconds. He had to remember why he was here and do everything he was able to keep himself together. He had to ignore the smells and the dirt and the whatever else that might irk him and concentrate on Emily.

But he was finding that difficult as Orinda led him through a series of narrow alleyways lined with litter and pock marked with little puddles of fetid water. It was more than a few minutes that they rushed through the streets and alleys and Draco had to be proud of himself that he had managed to keep his shoes mostly clean and dry. He was relieved when Orinda stopped and pointed to a building just ahead of them. "We're here, Draco," she said to him. He felt himself shudder when he looked at the building she had pointed out.

It was a ramshackle wooden structure, looking like it would certainly collapse come the next heavy wind. It was rectangular, a single story, and painted in a faded hue of turquoise which was chipping heavily to reveal shades of orange and red that were likely the remnants of former paint jobs. There was a washed out rainbow over the little corrugated metal door that seemed to be the only way in or out of the place, and the roof above it was sagging dangerously. Draco hated the thought that he was about to enter that building, but if that was where he was going to find Emily, then enter he would.

Orinda patted him on the shoulder before closing the final few meters distance between their position and the door. She turned the handle and ushered him inside. Draco shuddered again. The building was no better inside than out. The walls, he could only guess, had once been painted white, but now were stained with various degrees of filth and mildew from floor to ceiling. There was a little bench in this front room and Orinda pointed to it. "Sit," she ordered him. "It's four o'clock in the morning here. I'll not have you surprising Emily at this hour. Let me talk to her," Orinda insisted, "I'll see what I can do." Draco nodded as he hesitantly sank onto the splintering wooden bench, careful not to lean against the grimy wall behind him.

Thankfully, Orinda didn't take very long. She stepped quietly through the door she'd left by and looked over at Draco. "Just through there," she said to him.

"She's…" Draco wasn't sure what to say. Had Orinda really just told him that Emily was right through that rickety wooden door?

"Right through that door," Orinda finished his sentence for him as though she had read his mind. Maybe she had read his mind; it wouldn't be the first time. Draco rose to his feet slowly and swallowed hard. He realized in that moment that as much as he wanted to see Emily, to talk to her, he hadn't spent so much as a moment considering just what it was that he was going to say.

No matter that now. This was his moment to seize or to retreat. And he wasn't going to let himself leave this place without saying what he had come here to say; even if he wasn't entirely sure what that was. He strode as intently as his addled mind would let him across the room and through the door that Orinda had indicated.

And in an instant, there she was. Her back was to him and yet his breath was taken at the first glimpse of her pale skin and her strawberry locks. Even in the dim light of this little room, lined with shelves and packing crates; even kneeling on this dirty floor in a dress that had obviously not been laundered in weeks, she was stunning.

"Why did you come here, Draco?" he heard her ask. The sound of her voice was wonderful; as wonderful as he had imagined and remembered it. But her words were not those that he had wished to hear. But it was enough that she had spoken. And he had to answer her honestly. It was deceit and dishonesty that had gotten him into this dreadful situation and he could only hope that the truth and genuine contrition could get his life back for him.

"Tori's not pregnant," he said to her plainly, the most important piece of honesty he could find to share while his head was still swimming with the sight of her.

"That is a fact," she answered him, leaning over and swabbing the dirty floor with an equally dirty rag she had removed from a bucket in front of her. Draco felt his stomach tighten. She had chosen scrubbing filthy storerooms in the middle of the night and without the benefit of her wand over coming back to England and facing him. "A fact that 'Rin has already shared with me," she added, "but it is not an answer to my question."

"I came to tell you that I'm sorry and to beg your forgiveness," he said flatly, amazed at his ability to get the sentence out without breaking down.

"I'm listening," she said back to him, never even pausing the movement of the rag in her hands.

"I'm sorry," he began again, this time feeling tears coming back to him. "I'm sorry, Emily," he repeated. Would she ever turn around and look at him? "I am so sorry," he continued as he began falling apart. "It was a mistake. It was a huge mistake and I am so sorry for everything I've done, but I didn't mean it, it was just a mistake and now that there's no baby and…." It was all he could do to stay standing. It was beyond him to keep talking. He stood still and sobbed, waiting to see if she would say anything further to him.

"That it was," she replied quietly, "a mistake." She took a deep breath and re wet her rag in the bucket. "You got married today," she reminded him.

"I did," he allowed. "But it can be undone," he said. "We haven't…" he had no idea just how to explain to the woman he loved that he hadn't had sex with the woman he'd been forced to marry owing to the fact that he'd had sex with her to begin with. "I mean: the vows…."

"No need to elaborate," she insisted. Draco exhaled sharply, glad to be excused from that line of conversation.

"Please, Emily," Draco implored her. He couldn't help himself but to sink down onto the floor beside her and place his hand on her arm.

"Draco!" she cried; perhaps the first time he had ever heard her raise her voice outside of a medical emergency.

"I'm sorry," he sobbed. "Please, Emily…. I'm so sorry. Please just come back, give me another chance. It's all okay now. She's not pregnant, the marriage can be annulled, we can still have everything we wanted and I know I made a mistake but it's okay now. It's all going to be okay…."

"Oh Draco," Emily sighed, finally turning to look at him. Her eyes were swollen from tears that her voice had never betrayed. Draco hated that she was hurting, but hadn't he come here to make it all better? "You are such a child," she said, shaking her head. She pursed her lips and looked him in the eye. "You honestly thought that by coming here tonight and saying you're sorry I was going to take you back and everything was going to be right again?" She wasn't really asking.

"I…" he had to have an answer to that.

"Don't," she interrupted him. "You've got to understand, aroon," she began again using the Gaelic endearment she had addressed him by so often in their years together, "that 'sorry' is no magic word. Telling me that you're sorry doesn't change anything that's been done: not in the slightest. I have absolutely no doubt that you're sorry that any of this happened. I'm so terribly sorry it happened myself. But being sorry that it happened or sorry about the way it turned out is not enough, Draco. And just because you've not got a baby on the way as of this moment…. Certainly, yes, that makes things less complicated for you, but it doesn't make anything right. Draco, are you even aware that the mistake to which you have been referring was not made at the moment when Astoria found herself carrying your child, but in the moment when that entered into the realm of possibility?"

"Emily, I…"

"Draco," she interrupted him again, "just don't. There are no words to undo what you have done. And there is nothing that you or anyone else could say to me that would make me change my mind about the choices I've made. I have a life here now, Draco."

"Scrubbing floors?" he exclaimed, beginning to feel as angry at the situation as he had felt sad earlier.

"Scrubbing floors!" Emily exclaimed, standing up and taking a few steps away from him. "And cleaning bedpans and changing sheets and wiping noses and wiping bottoms and holding little babies as they cry who have never had anyone in their lives bother to hold them before. These children here need me far more than you ever did or you ever would."

"That's not true!" he exclaimed, leaping to his feet but somehow aware that stepping closer to her would not be a good idea.

"How can you say that?" she yelled back at him.

"Because you have no idea how much I need you!" he hollered back. "I needed you to begin with and if you had never gone away in the first place then none of this would have happened."

"I beg your pardon," she snapped back at him. Draco had never seen it before, but he was beginning to think that Emily had just as much an Irish temperament as a person could have, and he had a distinct feeling that he was about to be on the business end of its full force. "Are you trying to tell me that it is my fault that you cheated?" she asked him in a tone that frightened him.

"Emily, I'm just…" he had no idea how to rescue himself from this moment. "Let me stay?" he blurted out. He had known that she might not take him back so readily and if what it took to get her to remember that she loved him was for him to stay here and abide this squalor alongside her then so be it.

"Pardon me?" Emily asked, suddenly straight faced and with her arms crossed over her chest.

"Let me stay here, with you," he implored her again.

"You, here?" Emily asked, sounding still angry but almost amused at the prospect.

"Yes," Draco answered. "Me," he repeated, "here. If you say that these children need you and I say that I need you and maybe we're both right then the logical thing to do is for me to stay here and help you with your work and prove to you that I'll do anything to make things right again."

"Things will never be right, Draco," she told him. "And you wouldn't last three days here," she added.

"But I would, Emily, I…" that had been his last vestige of an argument and if she wasn't going to accept that then he couldn't let himself think about what might come next.

"No," she stated firmly. "It means a lot to me that you would offer," she admitted. "But no. You're not cut out for humanitarian work, Draco. It isn't in your makeup. And I don't judge you for that, it's just who you are. But if I let you stay here we'd only make each other more miserable and we'd have dragged three dozen innocent children into this mess with us; three dozen children who don't need any more turmoil thrust into their lives. You go home, Draco," she instructed calmly. "You go home to your beautiful manor house. Stay married or don't. But don't ever come here again. I might have been able to forgive you for infidelity, Draco, someday. But I don't know that I can ever get past your presumption that I would be ready and willing to abandon my hard thought life choices and dozens of children who have no one else to come back to England with you and make like everything is all right."

"I'm so sorry, Emily," Draco said again. It was all he could find in himself to say.

"Stop saying that," she instructed him firmly. "Don't tell me you're sorry. Don't even be sorry. Nothing is so bad that it couldn't be worse, aroon. Go and have your life and leave me to mine."

"But Emily…" he knew that was going to be the end of everything, and somehow he could even feel himself beginning to let go in that moment, but there was so much unsaid, so much that he had needed from tonight that he hadn't even begun to get. "I love you," he blurted out the one fact that might give her pause and make her reconsider his position and come around to his way of thinking.

And he realized it.

When had this fight become about winning? He had come here to spill his guts and to pour his heart out in hopes that the most wonderful person he had ever known might give him a second chance to love her any to maybe make her happy by extension. But sometime in their conversation it had stopped being about that. Draco had just wanted to win the fight. That wasn't what Emily deserved. And she certainly didn't deserve to have him tell her he loves her as a tactic.

She knew it, too. He could see it in her eyes that she knew it. And he figured that she could still read him well enough to tell from his face that he had just in that moment become aware.

"Goodbye, Draco," she said softly. He nodded his head.

It was over.

"Good bye, Emily," he said back. Draco turned his back to her, unable to look her in the face for even another second. He stepped to the door and moved to turn the handle.

"Is minic a rinne bromach gioblach capall cumasach," she called softly after him; and Irish saying that he had no idea the meaning of. But he would let her have those last words. He turned the handle and left the room, stepping quietly into the front room where Orinda was fiddling with a decrepit snitch that was no longer gold.

"Ready to go then?" she asked him. Draco nodded. It was time to leave this place.

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OOf! I can breathe now. Just a few notes: "Aroon" means 'darling' and the phrase "Is minic a rinne bromach gioblach capall cumasach" translates 'many a ragged colt made a noble horse' and is basically Emily's way of telling Draco that things will be all right if he'd just grow up.

It's all about the reviews. More soon... sooner if the review button down there gets some action. :)


	17. Chapter 17

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER ONE

Getting this chapter started was the hard part, but the end wrote itself. Here is another chapter; I think there will be one more and an epilogue... I think. :) I have a couple of ideas for more stories for once this is done. :) Another long chapter....

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Draco couldn't believe himself.

He had been so selfish. He had been every bit the self centered prat who had left for Hogwarts nearly a decade ago. Orinda had told him today how proud she was of how much he had matured. Little did she know. He hadn't changed. Here he had been thinking that the war and hardship and everything that had happened to him had changed him in some fundamental way that made him better; that made him worthy of a girl like Emily Flinders.

But that wasn't the case. He knew now that her turning him away was the best thing she could possibly have done; for both of them. She was surely better off without him. And he would grow from this. Hopefully he would grow into the kind of man his sisters could look up to, and someday his own children.

That was a thought he couldn't let himself dwell on too long and yet the single thing that kept creeping into his mind as he had silently followed Orinda back to the clay mantle and through the Floo network to her building in Portree. She had invited him to stay the night, but he had just shaken his head and taken his leave. He couldn't abide his own company, let alone the company of well meaning friends. There was too much turmoil.

He found an out-of-the-way place and apparated himself home to Coventry. It didn't take long, however, for his being alone with his own thoughts to wear awfully thin. He needed to quiet his mind and he had no idea how. But he was sure that sitting alone in the stillness of his house wasn't going to do the trick.

He decided very suddenly that he should pay his parents' house a visit. If there was one place in the whole world where he might find some peace it was back home. Everyone was likely asleep, but it was the best idea he had at the moment.

He stepped onto his front stoop and apparated to the second story balcony on the northwest corner of Malfoy Manor. There was only a single stone on that balcony to and from whence it was even possible to apparate and it occurred to Draco as he crossed the stones toward the door that he might think better of attempting a feat so precise with such an addled brain in the future. From the balcony he entered into the family's private library; the room in which they stored their most rare and sinister volumes. The shelves were a little leaner these days, owing to the fact that several of his parents' precious tomes had been declared dark artifacts by the Ministry of Magic and they were therefore required to surrender them to third party custody for the remainder of their lives as a condition of the pardons that had kept them from spending those lives in Azkaban.

Draco figured it was a small price to pay. And the books were still legally their property even though they were barred from physically possessing them. Draco's children would inherit those books someday and they would come back to the shelves in this room.

Draco's children…. There came that thought again. He shook his head in a physical attempt to clear the night's clutter from his mind. It was no use; the clutter and the chaos was there and he couldn't fathom a decent escape.

But there was finally an idea worth having. He left the library and tiptoed down the hall, heading as quietly as possible past the sleeping portraits and empty guest suites and staterooms to the back stairs. These had been his own private stairs since he was eleven. The third floor was the private area of the residence and housed both the children's wing and the master wing. The two were connected via a single hallway, but his parents had had the passage sealed when he left for Hogwarts; telling him that he was old enough not to have his parents barging into his rooms so easily.

The truth was that Draco's parents had barely been speaking to each other when he left for Hogwarts, and it had been that way for almost as long as he could remember. When he came home for Christmas holidays he had found his parents acting like lovesick schoolchildren and the passage from his rooms to theirs sealed shut. He had a very distinct feeling that their decision had been more for their privacy than his.

The passage had been opened again when Lilith was born, and Draco could easily have taken the front stairs in order to reach his sisters' rooms. But the idea of disturbing his parents' sleep were a portrait to be awakened wasn't one he relished. And besides, he was used to the back stairs.

It was a short trip down the hall from the top of the stairs into the nursery where he would find his two little sisters. As he pushed open the door he was surprised to see Lilith standing up in her crib. "Daco!" she greeted him, her mastery of the letter 'R' having not quite developed yet. Draco smiled and put his finger to his lips to shush her. He quickly shifted his gaze to Isis, who seemed to be sound asleep in her cradle. The last thing he wanted was a screaming baby.

"Hello Lilith," he whispered back to her, taking another step toward the crib.

"Dance," Lilith said, reaching out her little arms toward him.

"Yes," Draco affirmed, nodding his head as he reached her bedside, "we did dance today." Lilith was learning to walk and had enjoyed the novelty of dancing while her father or brother held her hands for balance. But she had found even more fun in being held while Draco twirled her around as though she were a lady of his same height.

"Dance," Lilith repeated. Draco smiled and nodded his head, reaching down in to the crib to pick her up.

"Okay," he acquiesced to what he was sure was a request. He held her up and began the steps of a tiny foxtrot underneath himself. "But we have to be quiet," he whispered in her ear as he spun the two of them around, "we don't want to wake the baby."

"Baby," Lilith repeated, pointing at her little sister's cradle. Draco nodded. She got smarter every day. Draco hugged her tighter and sank into the rocking chair near the door.

"Baby," he whispered to himself. He could remember distinctly the day Lilith was born. His father was a wreck, worried half to death over everything that might go wrong. He had mostly been annoyed. Draco remembered hating the idea of a younger brother; someone with whom he would always be compared. He hated that this little boy would get to have the childhood that his parents' estrangement and two wars and Harry bloody Potter had robbed him of. And he had been particularly peeved that nobody had bothered to ask him how he felt about the whole thing.

But then Emily had come in to the room where they were waiting, with a tiny bundle in her arms and announced that 'it's a girl'. And everything had changed. Somehow Draco had never considered that the baby might be a girl. A sister was a different thing altogether. And when his father had put little Lilith into his arms for the first time he had fallen instantly in love with her.

He'd thought about that moment a lot over the past couple of weeks; since Tori had told him she was pregnant. He remembered the fear and the joy his whole family had shared watching Narcissa be pregnant and, even as mad and as freaked out as he had been, some part of him had looked forward to experiencing that with his own child on the way. He had let himself get to a place where he was anxious for the moment when his own son or daughter would be put into his arms for the first time. He had fantasized about watching his child with his two sisters, letting Lilith hold the baby, seeing Isis learn to share her toys with her niece or nephew in much the same way as he had seen Lilith learn to share with Isis.

He realized at that moment, rocking his sister in the chair his mother had rocked him in when he was just as small, that he had grown quite attached to the idea of the child that was on the way. Tori hadn't seen him with his sisters, but he wondered if she had any understanding of the weight that her news had with him. They had been a couple once, he and Astoria, and when they decided it was over they had done so in such a way as to remain friends. She knew him pretty well. He wondered if she had known what his reaction was going to be when he got that news.

He thought she knew him well enough to know how he would feel about having fathered a child. And he thought he knew her well enough to say for certain that she wouldn't have lied to him about something so serious. She had seemed honest and upset enough when she told him she wasn't expecting. He wondered just then if it had been her upset and her worry over his upset, and not the need to manipulate him in to a marriage that had been what prevented her from seeking him out and giving him the news earlier.

"Draco," he heard his mother's voice. He turned his head to see her standing in the doorway.

"Hello mother," he greeted her, still rocking a now sleeping Lilith. "I'm sorry if we woke you," he apologized. Narcissa shook her head and took a step toward him.

"I had the feeling one of my children was upset," she explained, "I came down to check. I had no idea it would be my eldest," she added, placing her hand on his hair for a moment in a gesture of comfort he had known since childhood. Draco smiled up at his mother. She had a real gift for Legillimency and had never once in his entire life failed to come to him when he was upset. He had never even had to call; she had always just known. "What's on your mind?" she asked. Draco shook his head and sighed.

"Tori's not pregnant, mother," he answered her.

"Why that lying little…"

"No, mum," he interrupted before Narcissa could get the sentence out of her mouth. "I don't think she lied."

"You don't?" his mother asked, stepping around the front of the chair to look him in the eye. Draco shook his head.

"I don't," he affirmed. "I don't think she would lie to me about something like that," he shared. "And when she told me…" he trailed off. It was hitting him like a ton of stones being hurled one at a time that if he had begun to want that baby then perhaps she had wanted it too. He had handled himself rather poorly with her; thinking only of his own selfish desire to perhaps forget that the past few months had ever happened.

"What did she say?" his mother asked him, all of the edge of anger or upset gone completely from her voice. Draco shrugged.

"She said she wasn't sure if it was a false alarm to begin with or if she had been pregnant and just wasn't anymore."

"Well if that is the case," his mother began, a tremor entering into her voice and her bearing that Draco found most unsettling. He knew that his mother had lost two pregnancies before he was born, but he had been told by his father in no uncertain terms that he was never to bring that up. It wasn't something that they discussed, even when Lucius was scared out of his skin when Narcissa was pregnant with Lilith.

"I think it doesn't matter," Draco heard himself blurt out before his mother had too much time to dwell on the worst case scenario.

"I beg your pardon?" she asked, crossing her arms over her chest. Perhaps that had come out wrong.

"I don't mean it like that," he assured her. "I mean…." He shrugged his shoulders again and kissed Lilith on the top of her head. "I think it doesn't matter whether there ever was a baby or not," he began by way of explanation. This was all coming to him just now and he felt a little odd at not having his thoughts fully collected before he tried to enunciate them. Luckily it was his mother on the listening end and if anyone would be able to forgive him for any foible he made in this situation, it would be her. "I think the thing that matters is that she believed there was a baby. And I believed there was a baby. And I think she wanted it," he added. "I just realized I think I wanted it too."

"Oh Draco," his mother sighed, crossing to him and kneeling beside the chair with her hands on his arm. "I'm so sorry," she said. He nodded. He knew she knew how he was feeling, having been through similar traumatic losses herself.

"There's a lot I didn't want," he admitted. "The quick wedding, the forcible marriage…. But I don't think there was ever a moment when I didn't want the baby."

"You need to say these things to Astoria," Narcissa said to him, the faraway look in her eyes telling him that she was likely remembering events in her own history. Draco frowned. He had handled that rather badly.

"I really do, don't I?" he said back. He wasn't in love with Tori, but he didn't hate her, and after all that had gone on between them he felt as though he at least owed her a conversation. Narcissa nodded and stood up, reaching to take Lilith from him. Draco handed his sleeping sister to their mother and stood from the rocking chair. He leaned over and kissed his sister and then his mother on their nearly identical cheeks. "I'll see you soon, mum," he said to her as he stepped toward the door to the nursery.

"Good night, Draco," she told him. Draco shook his head.

That wasn't likely to be the case at all.

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Reviews are all I have to live for... :)

-MQ


	18. Chapter 18

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER ONE.

Ahhh- another normal length chapter. Only the epilogue left, but the next piece is already begun. Maybe more tongiht....

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By the time Draco got back to Lichtenstein, he was exhausted. No wonder, really; it had been a very long day. He trudged up the stairs and down the narrow hallway that led to the small stateroom that he and Tori had been sharing. He pushed open the door gingerly, wondering if Tori would even be there, and what state he might find her in if she was.

She was still there. Their trunks, which had been sent ahead of them packed for every contingency of a two week honeymoon, were out and Tori was in the middle of packing them. One by one she carried each of the dresses she had brought from the wardrobe into the trunk standing near the bed. Draco stood and watched for a moment before stepping into the room and addressing her. "We need to talk," he said quietly. Tori jumped a little.

"You startled me," she said back to him.

"I'm sorry," he offered. That was a start. He was sorry for a lot of things.

"Come in," she invited, taking her wand from the top of her trunk and pointing it at a pile of underclothes on a bench to levitate them into a trunk that sat open on the bed, thereby clearing him a seat. Draco moved slowly into the room, careful not to slip on the shards of glass that still littered the floor at the foot of the bed.

"You okay?" he asked, gesturing toward the shattered champagne bottle. Tori nodded.

"I'll have to have the dress cleaned," she answered, gesturing to her wedding dress, which was now hung over the door of the wardrobe.

"I'll take care of it," Draco offered.

"You don't have to do that," she answered. Draco shook his head and took a seat on the bench she had cleared.

"No," he insisted. "It's my fault. I'll take care of it."

"Thank you," she answered quietly, turning again to get back to her packing.

"Really, Tori," he said to her, "can we talk?"

"What's there to talk about?" she asked plainly, not missing even pausing her back and forth between the wardrobe and her trunk.

"When did you realize…?" he asked her, "That you weren't…" Tori shook her head and crossed her arms as she turned to look at him.

"It was Tuesday," she answered plainly but quietly.

"Are you all right?" he asked what had to be the most critical question. Astoria dropped her arms, and Draco could tell by the way the look on her face changed that she hadn't been expecting a sincere inquiry in to her well being.

"You don't want the details, I promise," she answered him. "But I will tell you I've been better."

"I'm sorry," Draco said again. How many times was he going to have to apologize today?

"Thank you," she replied, standing still.

"Is there anything I can do?" he asked," I mean, besides not yelling and throwing glassware." Tori chuckled.

"That right there will be a good start," she allowed. Draco felt himself relax a little; this was better. Tori was acting like herself.

"I didn't mean to be an arse," he apologized further.

"And I didn't mean to spring news on you," she said back. "I really just didn't know how to tell you."

"Yeah," Draco affirmed, "I get that. If it helps any," he added, "I don't think I blame you."

"You don't think?" she asked, frowning at him.

"Hey," he said, tossing his hands up in a gesture of surrender, "I'm trying to be honest here. I haven't had a lot of time to figure things out."

"I appreciate the honesty," she told him.

"Thanks," he answered, "it's new."

"Don't I know it," Tori teased back.

"You're not making it easy," he said. Tori wrinkled her nose at him.

"Is that for me to do?" she asked, "I thought you were supposed to be making things easier for me?"

"Look," Draco said, leaning back against the edge of the bed behind him. "I've only been a married man for half a day," he said, "I've got no bloody clue who's supposed to do what for whom." Tori rolled her eyes at him.

"I've not been married any longer than you have," she reminded him.

"Yeah," he allowed, "but don't girls start planning for being married like, as soon as they can walk?"

"Only the wedding part," Tori answered. "But we don't know anything more than you do about the rest."

"How did it stack up?" he asked. "The wedding, I mean." He hadn't paid so much attention to the day's festivities and now he wondered if it had lived up to any of Tori's wedding day fantasies.

"You were there," she stated plainly.

"I'm asking what you thought," he said back. Tori smiled.

"I loved it, actually," she admitted. "Your mother has amazing taste. The flowers and the music and the food and…" she shrugged her shoulders, "it was pretty perfect."

"We Malfoys do aim to please," he teased back.

"It was a great day," she affirmed.

"Well, until the flying bottle incident," he added. Tori chuckled.

"Right," she agreed with him, "shattered glass and wasted champagne notwithstanding." Draco laughed then, too. That was something he had always enjoyed about his relationship with Tori; they could laugh at anything together.

"I'm glad it wasn't the worst day of your life," he said honestly.

"How about you?" she asked, moving over to sit next to him and reclining against the far end of the bench where he was sitting. "What did you think? Was it the worst day of your life?" Draco had to laugh at that.

"Definitely not," he answered immediately. The worst day of his life might have been the day his father went to prison, or maybe it was the first time the Dark Lord had forced him to torture someone to death. It could have been the day that Professor Dumbledore had died, or the night that he had let Harry Potter get away and his house had been knocked half down and he'd seen his mother bleeding and his father beaten within an inch of his life. This day didn't even make the top ten.

Although finding out that he wasn't going to be a father in eight months wasn't his favorite bit of news, either. "The wedding part wasn't bad at all," he added, "and the reception was kind of fun."

"It was," she agreed with him. "I had fun."

"Good," he said.

"So what do you want to do about it?" Astoria asked him plainly, standing up again and leaning against the nearest bedpost.

"About what?" Draco asked her.

"About the fact that we're married, Draco," she answered dryly.

"I don't know," he replied. And he really didn't. He had thought about that a lot; what was to be done. He was inclined not to do anything at all.

"You don't know?" Tori sounded confused.

"Look," he said back to her, standing as well. "We could have it annulled," he mentioned, beginning to pace back and forth between the bench and the wardrobe. "But that would make both of our families have to deal with all manner of controversy seeing as the story they've already fed to the rest of the world and to the press is that we've already been married for more than a week and there will be a lot of speculation as to why we were able to strip away the magic of our vows so easily."

"But we can't just go the traditional dissolution route, either," she said. "That doesn't work unless the magic has taken hold. And the magic doesn't take hold until the marriage is consummated and something tells me that it would be a bad idea for us to go to bed together just so the laws of magic will let us get a divorce. Not to mention the fact," she added, "that due to circumstances previously discussed, that is in no way an option tonight."

"Right," Draco nodded, glad that she had chosen to spare him the details. "So what seems like the most logical conclusion is that we just stay married." He shrugged his shoulders. It really was the least painful option for everyone involved.

"Do you mean that?" Tori asked, climbing around the bed post to sit on the bed. "Just stay married?" she continued, clearly miffed. "Just like that?"

"Just like that," he answered her. "In a year and a day the magic expires if we haven't… you know…."

"Consummated?" she said for him.

"Yeah, that," he affirmed. "And if we have, then we can decide to stay married or not after that but then dissolving the marriage magically won't raise the sorts of eyebrows that it would if we got annulled right away."

"And if the magic just expires, because we go a year and figure out that it's just not ever going to work…" she continued the thought.

"Then we split up quietly and we don't need the vows annulled because they've annulled themselves," Draco finished the thought. "Of course," he continued, "we could find that this suits us and decide to stay married for the rest of our lives."

"I suppose that could happen," she agreed tentatively. "It's not like we were completely forced into this relationship," she added.

"We did find each other in the first place," he affirmed.

"All right then," she said to him, standing again and crossing to him. "We stay married." Tori put her hand out for him to shake. Taking her hand and shaking it firmly, Draco smiled at her.

"Now," he asked, still holding onto her hand, "can we get these blasted trunks off the bed and go to sleep?"

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And that's how it happened, folks, that Draco Malfoy came to be married to a girl we never heard mentioned in canon. Epilogue later. :) Reviews keep me alive (and writing)

-MQ


	19. EPILOGUE

DISCLAIMER IN CHAPTER ONE

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_Eight years later:_

What the hell was taking so long?

As though the first forty one weeks hadn't been long enough to wait to meet this baby, they had to drag these last few hours out forever? Draco stood up and began to pace again.

Everyone he cared about was in this room with him, and he had been assured by Dr. Bradenberg herself that everything was completely normal with Astoria and the baby, but he just couldn't get over the anxiety.

"Calm down, son," his father insisted, eliciting a laugh from his aunt An. If he hadn't been so stressed out, Draco would likely have laughed as well. He could remember distinctly how crazed with worry his father had been during the birth of both of his little sisters.

"You are no one to talk, Lucius," Andromeda reminded him. "You were ten times worse when the girls were born."

"Why is that?" Isis asked, crossing the rug to climb into her father's lap.

"Because your mother was sick," Orinda Lynch answered for the obviously flustered Lucius. "And having babies isn't any fun until you've actually got them."

"And you should know," Narcissa Malfoy added to the conversation as she rocked Orinda's eight-week-old son, Arin.

"Aye, that I do," Orinda answered, taking hold of Draco by the shoulders and steering him back to his chair and glass of brandy.

"But I'm doing better than Aiden did," Draco reminded his friend. "All Aiden did all day was get drunk and crash his broomstick into the window."

"Aunt 'Rin?" Lilith asked quietly from where she had been reading on the settee.

"Yes Lilith?" Orinda answered.

"May I hold baby Arin next?" she asked.

"Yes you may," Orinda answered her, "unless you'd like him, Draco?" Draco shook his head. It was good that Aiden and Orinda's son had been born two months before his own child was due. It had been some time since he had held an infant; since Isis was little. He had been very glad to have a baby around to make him focus on everything wonderful that was about to happen instead of the worry that had kept creeping into the back of his mind.

Arin's having arrived without incident had also been a huge weight off of Draco's mind. Having Isis had almost killed his mother eight years ago and that had come more and more into his mind the longer he had waited for his baby to be born. No matter how much anyone told him that everything was going to be fine, however, he wasn't going to believe it until the baby was born and all was well.

He would take any 'I told you so' any of them cared to fling after the fact.

"If Lilith gets to hold the baby, then I want to hold him, too," Isis insisted. "Mummy let me hold him?" Narcissa Malfoy shook her head toward her younger daughter.

"No, Isis," she said, "Lilith asked first." Draco could tell that Isis was about to have a fit. She did that on occasion. Isis was more spoiled than any child Draco had ever known, and that was saying something coming from him.

"We can take turns," Lilith said to her sister. How that sweet girl found patience with her prat of a sister, Draco would never know.

"What is taking so bloody long?" Draco finally asked out loud. This whole enterprise was driving him crazy.

"This is nothing, Draco," his mother told him as she settled Arin Lynch into Lilith's arms. "It's only been an hour and a half."

"Finish your drink," Orinda told him. Draco frowned. He did not want to finish his drink. He wanted to know just what the hell was going on in the next room. His home in Coventry was laid out much like his parents' manor in Wiltshire, with a sitting room adjacent to the maternity suite. His family had come to sit with him once Dr. Bradenberg had declared that today was absolutely the day, but he didn't appreciate having to be in the sitting room at all.

He didn't think it was at all fair that he had been forced out of the maternity suite once heavy labor had begun but for some reason Tori's mother and sister had been allowed to stay. So what if they were both women with children of their own? This was HIS child being born and he thought it mightily wrong that other people would get to see the baby before he did.

"It's a boy!" Draco heard hollered from the doorway. He stood up and raced to the door as it opened, revealing Astoria's sister Daphne holding the tiny newborn in her arms. Daphne handed the baby to him right away and moved the blanket out of the infant's face.

"It's a boy," Draco repeated as everyone came to crowd around him.

"Congratulations, son," Lucius Malfoy offered, patting Draco on his shoulder as he peered down at the face of his grandson. Orinda, who had taken little Arin back from Lilith, came up alongside her friend.

"They'll be best friends," Draco said to her, regarding her son and then his own. Orinda nodded.

"And teammates," she added.

"And Slytherins," Isis added, standing on tiptoe to try and get a look at the newborn. "Like we're going to be, too." Draco bent down so that his little sisters could get a view of their new nephew.

"He looks like you," Lilith told her brother.

"He does," a misty-eyed Narcissa agreed.

"Does he have a name, Draco?" Isis asked. It was a long held Malfoy superstition that even had parents decided on a name for their unborn child, they never speak it out loud until after the child has been born. Draco nodded. He smiled at the assembled people and answered them.

"Lucius Scorpius Commodus Malfoy," he told them. Draco couldn't even believe the relief he felt at finally saying his son's name; at finally seeing his baby.

He looked down at the swaddled newborn in his arms. His son really did look a lot like him. In fact, the baby reminded his father a lot of the way both of his little sisters had looked at that size; which made perfect sense seeing as all of them took after Lucius Malfoy save for the Black nose and the Rosier chin. Scorpius had them too, those resemblances to his ancestors. Draco loved that.

As he moved to sit on the sofa with his new baby in his arms, Draco thought briefly on the journey that had gotten him here; the wars and the chaos, the heartbreaks, the happiness, the marriage that shouldn't have lasted. It had taken him and Tori some time to develop their marriage into a relationship they both enjoyed full time, but they had both agreed very early on that that was what they wanted. They were right for each other on paper and actually enjoyed each other's company. That was as much as any pair of purebloods could hope for, really. If they hadn't decided to stay together then they would likely have both been subjected to arranged marriages and the clear preference was to the devil they knew over the devil they didn't.

He liked his marriage now. And when Astoria had informed him that they were going to be parents, he couldn't remember a happier moment in his life. The only moment that could have topped that one was this one; here with his family and friends and with his new baby boy.

He loved this boy, this child that was his blood. And in that moment he loved Astoria more than he thought he could for giving him his beautiful son. He had everything that he ought to have, and everything he wanted. Blood and love; he had it all.

THE END.

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I am working on two other stories simultaneously at the moment ( a one-shot at Hogwarts and a multi-parter that runs concurrently to another piece I did years ago) and should have something else up very soon. Remember to review, please....Cheers!

-MQ


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